Wal-Mart is the world's largest retailer. Within the United Kingdom, retailing has generally been considered as a local or national activity. Wal-Mart's purchase of ASDA in 1999 illustrates the global scale of much modern retailing. In this paper we consider the implications of Wal-Mart's takeover of ASDA. First, the key drivers of Wal-Mart's business success are analysed. Second, the impact of Wal-Mart in Canada and Germany is considered. Third, the match of Wal-Mart with ASDA is examined. F...

Objectives. The instruments used for measuring nursing workload in the intensive care unit (e.g., Therapeutic Intervention Scoring System-28) are based on therapeutic interventions related to severity of illness. Many nursing activities are not necessarily related to severity of illness, and cost-ef

Supermarkets such as Asda (owned by Wal-Mart) have responded to the growth in direct marketing and alternative agri-food networks by promoting local produce ranges, and increasingly sourcing organic produce from the UK. Thus consumers now have a choice of outlets for local and organic produce. This paper examines the implications of that choice for direct marketing in particular, and sustainable consumption in general. The paper tests the hypothesis that consumers make a conscious choice to e...

The objective of this study was to present the computerized structure that enables the use of the Nursing ActivitiesScore (NAS) in mobile technology. It is a project for the development of technology production based on software engineering, founded on the theory of systems development life cycle. The NAS system was built in two modules: the search module, which is accessed using a personal computer (PC), and Data Collection module, which is accessed through a mobile device (Smartphone). The NAS system was constructed to allow other forms, in addition to the NAS tool, to be included in the future. Thus, it is understood that the development of the NAS will bring nurses closer to mobile technology and facilitate their accessibility to the data of the instrument relating to patients, thus assisting in decision-making and in staffing to provide nursing care. PMID:22241201

Performing music on the basis of reading a score requires reading ahead of what is being played in order to anticipate the necessary actions to produce the notes. Score reading thus not only involves the decoding of a visual score and the comparison to the auditory feedback, but also short-term storage of the musical information due to the delay of the auditory feedback during reading ahead. This study investigates the mechanisms of encoding of musical information in short-term memory during ...

(from all time points) with concurrent MRI measures of synovitis and bone edema in the development cohort. Based on regression coefficients, modified versions of the Disease ActivityScore in 28 joints (M-DAS28), Simplified Disease Activity Index (M-SDAI), and Clinical Disease Activity Index (M......-CDAI) were generated for each subject in the validation cohort. The M-DAS28, M-SDAI, and M-CDAI scores were compared to conventional scores of disease activity with regard to associations with MRI measures of synovitis and radiographic progression, assessed using Pearson's and Spearman's correlations, linear......'s global assessment of disease activity using a visual analog scale (EvGA score). Modified disease activityscores were generated using the regression coefficients obtained in the synovitis models for all subjects in the validation cohort; modified scores were calculated as M-DAS28 = 0.49 × ln(CRP) + 0...

Accurate assessment of disease activity in patients with otorhinolaryngological manifestations of granulomatosis with polyangiitis (Wegener's) (ENT/GPA) is necessary for treatment decisions and clinical trials. We have designed a disease activityscore (ENT/GPA DAS) for this purpose....

outcome indices of these domains from archived randomized clinical trials in FM. Possible clinical domains that could be included in a responder index and disease activityscore include pain, fatigue, sleep disturbance, cognitive dysfunction, mood disturbance, tenderness, stiffness, and functional...... impairment. Outcome measures for these domains demonstrate good to adequate psychometric properties, although measures of cognitive dysfunction need to be further developed. The approach used in the development of responder indices and disease activityscores for rheumatoid arthritis and ankylosing...

Do individual differences in the brain mechanisms for arithmetic underlie variability in high school mathematical competence? Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we correlated brain responses to single digit calculation with standard scores on the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT) math subtest in high school seniors. PSAT math scores, while controlling for PSAT Critical Reading scores, correlated positively with calculation activation in the left supramarginal gyrus and bilateral anterior cingulate cortex, brain regions known to be engaged during arithmetic fact retrieval. At the same time, greater activation in the right intraparietal sulcus during calculation, a region established to be involved in numerical quantity processing, was related to lower PSAT math scores. These data reveal that the relative engagement of brain mechanisms associated with procedural versus memory-based calculation of single-digit arithmetic problems is related to high school level mathematical competence, highlighting the fundamental role that mental arithmetic fluency plays in the acquisition of higher-level mathematical competence. PMID:23283330

Full Text Available A fundamental trait of the human self is its continuum experience of space and time. Perceptual aberrations of this spatial and temporal continuity is a major characteristic of schizophrenia spectrum disturbances--including schizophrenia, schizotypal personality disorder and schizotypy. We have previously found the classical Perceptual Aberration Scale (PAS scores, related to body and space, to be positively correlated with both behavior and temporo-parietal activation in healthy participants performing a task involving self-projection in space. However, not much is known about the relationship between temporal perceptual aberration, behavior and brain activity. To this aim, we composed a temporal Perceptual Aberration Scale (tPAS similar to the traditional PAS. Testing on 170 participants suggested similar performance for PAS and tPAS. We then correlated tPAS and PAS scores to participants' performance and neural activity in a task of self-projection in time. tPAS scores correlated positively with reaction times across task conditions, as did PAS scores. Evoked potential mapping and electrical neuroimaging showed self-projection in time to recruit a network of brain regions at the left anterior temporal cortex, right temporo-parietal junction, and occipito-temporal cortex, and duration of activation in this network positively correlated with tPAS and PAS scores. These data demonstrate that schizotypal perceptual aberrations of both time and space, as reflected by tPAS and PAS scores, are positively correlated with performance and brain activation during self-projection in time in healthy individuals along the schizophrenia spectrum.

OBJECTIVE: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the spine is increasingly important in the assessment of inflammatory activity in clinical trials with patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS). We investigated feasibility, inter-reader reliability, sensitivity to change, and discriminatory ability...... of 3 different scoring methods for MRI activity and change in activity of the spine in patients with AS. METHODS: Thirty sets of spinal MRI at baseline and after 24 weeks of followup, derived from a randomized clinical trial comparing a tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-blocking drug (n = 20) with placebo...... (n = 10) and selected to cover a wide range of activity at baseline and change in activity, were presented electronically in a partial latin-square design to 9 experienced readers from different countries (Europe, Canada). Readers scored each set of MRI 3 times, using 3 different methods including...

Full Text Available The aim of the study was to evaluate atherosclerosis in ankylosing spondylitis (AS through the assessment of morphological and functional measures of subclinical atherosclerosis. Twenty patients [M/F=12/8, age (median/range 43.5/28-69 years; disease duration (median/range 9.7/1-36 years] with AS classified according to modified New York criteria and twenty age and sex related healthy controls with negative past medical history for cardiovascular events were enrolled in the study. In all patients and controls, the intima-media thickness (IMT of common carotid artery, carotid bulb and internal carotid artery, and the flow-mediated dilatation (FMD of non-dominant arm brachial artery were determined, using a sonographic probe Esaote GPX (Genoa, Italy. Furthermore, we assess the main disease activity and disability indices [bath ankylosing spondylitis disease activity index, ankylosing spondylitis disease activityscore-eritrosedimentation rate (ASDAS-ESR, ASDAS-C-reactive protein (CRP, bath ankylosing spondylitis metrology index, bath ankylosing spondylitis functional index and acute phase reactants. Plasmatic values of total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein, high-density lipoprotein, triglyceride and homocysteine were carried out in all twenty patients. IMT at carotid bulb was significant higher in patients than in controls (0.67 mm vs 0.54 mm; P=0.03. FMD did not statistically differ between patients and controls (12.5% vs 15%; P>0.05. We found a correlation between IMT at carotid bulb and ESR (rho 0.43; P=0.04. No correlation was found between FMD and disease activity and disability indices. This study showed that in AS patients, without risk factors for cardiovascular disease, carotid bulb IMT, morphological index of subclinical atherosclerosis, is higher than in controls.

A fundamental trait of the human self is its continuum experience of space and time. Perceptual aberrations of this spatial and temporal continuity is a major characteristic of schizophrenia spectrum disturbances – including schizophrenia, schizotypal personality disorder and schizotypy. We have previously found the classical Perceptual Aberration Scale (PAS) scores, related to body and space, to be positively correlated with both behavior and temporo-parietal activation in healthy participan...

This brief research note examined the reliability of scores from an accelerometer as measures of sedentary and physical activity behaviors in persons with multiple sclerosis (MS). The analysis was performed on a combined data set from 2 previous longitudinal investigations of physical activity in MS. We focused on the number of days required to reliably estimate sedentary behavior, based on time spent in sedentary behavior per day and number of sedentary breaks, number of long sedentary bouts, and average length of sedentary bouts per day. We further examined the number of days required to reliably estimate physical activity behavior, based on time spent in light and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity and average length of activity bouts per day. Between 4-6 days of monitoring and 3-7 days of monitoring were necessary for good reliability of scores from all sedentary outcomes and physical activity outcomes, respectively. These results should guide research and practice examining sedentary and physical activity behaviors using accelerometry in persons with MS. PMID:27078272

Full Text Available Introduction: Physical activity has become an important intervention against overweight and obesity cases in the USA and worldwide. One key aspect of physical activity is walking, which has been identified as a component that can easily be incorporated into one’s lifestyle. Recent studies on physical activity have focused on promoting walking as a health enhancing endeavor. In 2010, the proportion of Texas adults who reported no participation in leisure time activity (26.7% was significantly higher than the national average (24.4%. However, many Texans, like most Americans, are sedentary. Purpose: This study examined the walkability of the environments in selected counties in east Texas including Wood, Van Zandt and Smith counties. Methods and material: The data was drawn from the Walkscore.com and was based on all the zip codes in the three counties in east Texas. The community capitals were used a framework for analysis. Results: Only three (8.82% zip codes had walkable scores between 70 and 89; five (14.71% had scores between 50 and 69; four (11.76% between 25 and 49 and 22 (64.71% had a score below 24. Discussion: The vast majority (26, 76.47% of zip codes are highly dependent on vehicle transport. Conclusions and recommendations: Stakeholders need therefore to focus on causes for the minimal walkability so that practical interventions are generated to enhance the physical activity friendly infrastructure so as to enhance the well-being of the residents in these three east Texas counties.

combined with other drugs. The primary endpoint of efficacy included the proportion of patients with low disease activity [simplified disease activity index (SDAI)≤11] at 3 month and 6 month. Secondary endpoint variables included clinical disease activity index (CDAI), disease activityscore 28 based on C-reactive protein (DAS28-CRP) and health assessment questionnaire(HAQ). The primary endpoint of SpA was the ankylosing spondylitis disease activityscore (ASDAS-CRP) at month 3. The secondary endpoints were the proportion of subjects achieving ASDAS<1.3 and ASDAS<2.1, Bath AS functional index (BASFI) and CRP. All subjects in the study were evaluated for safety. T test, χ2 test and rank sum test were used for satistical analysis. Results One thousand two hundred and seventy subjects with ERA were studied. The difference between the baseline and month 3 after treatment in SDAI, CDAI, DAS28-CRP were 26 ±16, 23 ±15, 1.86 ± 1.01 respectively (P<0.01). The above parameters 6 months after treatment were similar to those at 3 months after treatment, which demonstrated the persistence of drug efficacy. Two thousand three hundred and twenty eight subjects of SpA were studied. The difference between the baseline and 3 months after treatment in ASDAS, BASFI was 2.6 ±1.7, 3.4 ±3.8 respectively (t=73 .54, t=42 .36, P<0.01). The overall incidence of adverse events was 8.03%(289/3 598), including the common adverse events such as injection site reactions, skin rash and elevated liver enzyme levels. Adverse events were improved after proper treatment, without severe infections and tumor. These data confirmed that the overall safety of rhTNFR: Fc was good. Conclusion The study confirms that rhTNFR: Fc is effective for the treatment of ERA and SpA, and it is safe and well-tolerated.

Several multi-item activities of daily living (ADL) scales have been developed for assessment of functional status of patients with Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) in the last few decades. A disadvantage of the large number of scales is that scores of different ADL scales cannot be compared directly with each other. ADL scales which are used by McNamee’s (Townsend's disability scale) and Hill’s (Medicare Beneficiary definitions and Katz index of ADL) provide suitable tools for modelling the cost-eff...

This report summarizes the discussion during a module update at OMERACT 8 on scoring methods for activity in the spine on magnetic resonance imaging. The conclusion was that the 3 available scoring methods are all very good with respect to discrimination and feasibility: the Ankylosing Spondylitis...

Objective: To correlate disease activityscore (DAS-28) in the patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with and without secondary fibromyalgia. Study Design: Comparative cross-sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Department of Rheumatology, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, Islamabad, from November 2011 to April 2012. Methodology: Patients aged above 16 years diagnosed to have rheumatoid arthritis according to ACR/EULAR criteria 2010 were included in the study. Fibromyalgia (FM) was diagnosed by ACR 1990 criteria. Patients of other autoimmune diseases or psychiatric illnesses were excluded. DAS was determined and compared using t-test with significance at p < 0.05. Results: The mean age of study subjects was 42.9 years. Thirty one out of total 138 patients had fibromyalgia (22.4%). Female gender was predominant (92.0%); being 96.8% in patients with and in 88.2% without fibromyalgia. The average DAS score was high (5.3 + 1.5) in fibromyalgia patients compared to those without fibromyalgia (3.9 + 1.2); this difference in mean value was statistically significant (p = < 0.001). Conclusion: DAS-28 is a useful tool for assessing rheumatoid arthritis disease status in outpatient setting, however, increased disease activity must be assessed for possible co-existence of fibromyalgia which can spuriously give high DAS value and adversely affect treatment decision. (author)

Metabolic syndrome is a complex disorder represented by a set of cardiovascular risk factors. A healthy lifestyle is strongly related to improve Quality of Life and interfere positively in the control of risk factors presented in this condition. To evaluate the effect of a program of lifestyle modification on the Framingham General Cardiovascular Risk Profile in subjects diagnosed with metabolic syndrome. A sub-analysis study of a randomized clinical trial controlled blind that lasted three months. Participants were randomized into four groups: dietary intervention + placebo (DIP), dietary intervention + supplementation of omega 3 (fish oil 3 g/day) (DIS3), dietary intervention + placebo + physical activity (DIPE) and dietary intervention + physical activity + supplementation of omega 3 (DIS3PE). The general cardiovascular risk profile of each individual was calculated before and after the intervention. The study included 70 subjects. Evaluating the score between the pre and post intervention yielded a significant value (p < 0.001). We obtained a reduction for intermediate risk in 25.7% of subjects. After intervention, there was a significant reduction (p < 0.01) on cardiovascular age, this being more significant in groups DIP (5.2%) and DIPE (5.3%). Proposed interventions produced beneficial effects for reducing cardiovascular risk score. This study emphasizes the importance of lifestyle modification in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases.

Metabolic syndrome is a complex disorder represented by a set of cardiovascular risk factors. A healthy lifestyle is strongly related to improve Quality of Life and interfere positively in the control of risk factors presented in this condition. To evaluate the effect of a program of lifestyle modification on the Framingham General Cardiovascular Risk Profile in subjects diagnosed with metabolic syndrome. A sub-analysis study of a randomized clinical trial controlled blind that lasted three months. Participants were randomized into four groups: dietary intervention + placebo (DIP), dietary intervention + supplementation of omega 3 (fish oil 3 g/day) (DIS3), dietary intervention + placebo + physical activity (DIPE) and dietary intervention + physical activity + supplementation of omega 3 (DIS3PE). The general cardiovascular risk profile of each individual was calculated before and after the intervention. The study included 70 subjects. Evaluating the score between the pre and post intervention yielded a significant value (p < 0.001). We obtained a reduction for intermediate risk in 25.7% of subjects. After intervention, there was a significant reduction (p < 0.01) on cardiovascular age, this being more significant in groups DIP (5.2%) and DIPE (5.3%). Proposed interventions produced beneficial effects for reducing cardiovascular risk score. This study emphasizes the importance of lifestyle modification in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Physical therapy is recommended for the management of axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA and flexibility exercises have traditionally been the main focus. Cardiovascular (CV diseases are considered as a major health concern in axSpA and there is strong evidence that endurance and strength exercise protects against CV diseases. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the efficacy of high intensity endurance and strength exercise on disease activity and CV health in patients with active axSpA. METHODS: In a single blinded randomized controlled pilot study the exercise group (EG performed 12 weeks of endurance and strength exercise while the control group (CG received treatment as usual. The primary outcome was the Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS Disease ActivityScore (ASDAS. Secondary outcomes included patient reported disease activity (Bath AS Disease Activity Index [BASDAI], physical function (Bath AS Functional Index [BASFI], and CV risk factors measured by arterial stiffness (Augmentation Index [Alx] and Pulse Wave Velocity [PWV], cardiorespiratory fitness (VO2 peak and body composition. ANCOVA on the post intervention values with baseline values as covariates was used to assess group differences, and Mann Whitney U-test was used for outcomes with skewed residuals. RESULTS: Twenty-eight patients were included and 24 (EG, n = 10, CG, n = 14 completed the study. A mean treatment effect of -0.7 (95%CI: -1.4, 0.1 was seen in ASDASscore. Treatment effects were also observed in secondary outcomes (mean group difference [95%CI]: BASDAI: -2.0 (-3.6, -0.4, BASFI: -1.4 (-2.6, -0.3, arterial stiffness (estimated median group differences [95% CI]: AIx (%: -5.3 (-11.0, -0.5, and for PVW (m/s: -0.3 (-0.7, 0.0, VO2 peak (ml/kg/min (mean group difference [95%CI]: 3.7 (2.1, 5.2 and trunk fat (%: -1.8 (-3.0, -0.6. No adverse events occurred. CONCLUSION: High intensity exercise improved disease activity and reduced CV risk factors in

considered by the reader as the most abnormal, with additional scores for "depth" and "intensity." Both the order of the methods used by each reader and the timepoints (before/after treatment) were randomized. Feasibility of each scoring system was evaluated by measuring the mean time needed to score each....... Discriminatory ability was assessed using Z-scores (Mann-Whitney test) comparing change in score between patients treated with TNF-blocking drug and placebo. RESULTS: The mean time to score one set of MRI was shortest for the Berlin method. SDC was lowest for the Berlin method and highest for SPARCC. Overall...

physicians with a convenient measurement tool to monitor patients in a clinical setting and support rapid treatment adjustment and tighter disease control. This article examines peer-reviewed publications cited in PubMed that describe the multi-biomarker disease activityscore, its development and validation, and its applications as an objective disease assessment tool in patients with RA. Keywords: algorithm, multi-biomarker disease activityscore, disease activity, rheumatoid arthritis, Vectra DA

... are more likely to have low scores than infants with normal births. These scores may reflect difficulties the baby experienced during labor or problems with her heart or respiratory system. What if Your Baby Scores Low? If your ...

Conclusion The circulating IL-18 and IL-10 concentrations were significantly elevated in SLE patients and correlated with the SLEDAI score. The study emphasized that there exists an upregulated proinflammatory as well as anti-inflammatory responses in patients with active SLE; however, the anti-inflammatory response is not enough to suppress the active disease. Identifying the exact contribution of the currently studied cytokines might provide future insights for targeted therapeutic strategies in SLE.

Full Text Available Indirect immunofluorescence (IIF has been used to identify and measure autoantibody levels in pemphigus vulgaris but data about relationship between clinical severity of disease and antibody titers by IIF have been conflicting. We conducted this cross-sectional study to correlate the severity of oral and/or cutaneous involvement in patients with pemphigus vulgaris based on Pemphigus Area and ActivityScore with IIF titers. Sixty-one new pemphigus vulgaris patients were included in this study. Human prepuce was used as substrate for IIF and assessment of disease severity was based on Pemphigus Area and ActivityScore. The mean±SD age was 44.04±30.46 years, with a range of 18 to 79 years. IIF was positive in 56 (91.8% patients. There was a significant relationship between total disease score and IIF titers ((P<0.001. Also a significant relationship was found between skin score (P=0.04 and mucosal score (P=0.04 with IIF titers. Our results show that there is a significant relationship between disease activity based on Pemphigus Area and ActivityScore and antibody titers by IIF. Further studies are recommended to determine the usefulness of this technique for monitoring disease.

Full Text Available Background. Prostate cancer is the most common noncutaneous cancer and second leading cause of cancer-related mortality in men in the US. Growing evidence suggests that oxidative stress is involved in prostate cancer. Methods. In this study, thioredoxin 1 (Trx 1, an enzyme and subcellular indicator of redox status, was measured in prostate biopsy tissue from 55 men from the North Carolina-Louisiana Prostate Cancer Project. A pathologist blindly scored levels of Trx 1. The association between Trx 1 and the Gleason score, erythrocyte antioxidant enzyme activity, and dietary antioxidant intake was determined using Fisher’s exact test. Results. Trx 1 levels in benign prostate tissue in men with incident prostate cancer were positively associated with the Gleason score (P=0.01 and inversely associated with dietary antioxidant intake (P=0.03. In prostate cancer tissue, Trx 1 levels were associated with erythrocyte glutathione peroxidase activity (P=0.01. No association was found for other erythrocyte enzymes. Greater Gleason score of malignant tissue corresponds to a greater difference in Trx 1 levels between malignant and benign tissue (P=0.04. Conclusion. These results suggest that the redox status of prostate tissue is associated with prostate cancer grade and both endogenous and exogenous antioxidants.

Assessment of disease activity in vasculitis can be achieved using the BVAS, a clinical checklist of relevant symptoms, signs and features of active disease. The aim of this study was to revalidate the BVAS version 3 (BVAS v. 3) in a cohort of patients with systemic vasculitis.

Pathologists provide diagnoses relevant to the disease state of the patient and identify specific tissue characteristics relevant to response to therapy and prognosis. As personalized medicine evolves, there is a trend for increased demand of tissue-derived parameters. Pathologists perform increasingly complex analyses on the same 'cases'. Traditional methods of workload assessment and reimbursement, based on number of cases sometimes with a modifier (eg, the relative value unit (RVU) system used in the United States), often grossly underestimate the amount of work needed for complex cases and may overvalue simple, small biopsy cases. We describe a new approach to pathologist workload measurement that aligns with this new practice paradigm. Our multisite institution with geographically diverse partner institutions has developed the Automatable Activity-Based Approach to Complexity Unit Scoring (AABACUS) model that captures pathologists' clinical activities from parameters documented in departmental laboratory information systems (LISs). The model's algorithm includes: 'capture', 'export', 'identify', 'count', 'score', 'attribute', 'filter', and 'assess filtered results'. Captured data include specimen acquisition, handling, analysis, and reporting activities. Activities were counted and complexity units (CUs) generated using a complexity factor for each activity. CUs were compared between institutions, practice groups, and practice types and evaluated over a 5-year period (2008-2012). The annual load of a clinical service pathologist, irrespective of subspecialty, was ∼40,000 CUs using relative benchmarking. The model detected changing practice patterns and was appropriate for monitoring clinical workload for anatomical pathology, neuropathology, and hematopathology in academic and community settings, and encompassing subspecialty and generalist practices. AABACUS is objective, can be integrated with an LIS and automated, is reproducible, backwards compatible

The investigation of the complex processes involved in cellular differentiation must be based on unbiased, high throughput data processing methods to identify relevant biological pathways. A number of bioinformatics tools are available that can generate lists of pathways ranked by statistical significance (i.e. by p-value), while ideally it would be desirable to functionally score the pathways relative to each other or to other interacting parts of the system or process. We describe a new computational method (Network ActivityScore Finder - NASFinder) to identify tissue-specific, omics-determined sub-networks and the connections with their upstream regulator receptors to obtain a systems view of the differentiation of human adipocytes. Adipogenesis of human SBGS pre-adipocyte cells in vitro was monitored with a transcriptomic data set comprising six time points (0, 6, 48, 96, 192, 384 hours). To elucidate the mechanisms of adipogenesis, NASFinder was used to perform time-point analysis by comparing each time point against the control (0 h) and time-lapse analysis by comparing each time point with the previous one. NASFinder identified the coordinated activity of seemingly unrelated processes between each comparison, providing the first systems view of adipogenesis in culture. NASFinder has been implemented into a web-based, freely available resource associated with novel, easy to read visualization of omics data sets and network modules.

Full Text Available Several studies have indicated that depressive states may lead to hypokinesia with diminished metabolic rate and energy use. Hypokinesia associated with certain eating behaviors may lead to an unfavorable energy balance that can contribute to the emergence and prevalence of obesity among children and adults. The purpose of the present study was to examine the possibility of reducing depression inventory scores in female adolescents with third-degree obesity while testing the effectiveness of different exercise programs in reducing anxiety and depression scores. The sample consisted of 40 female subjects (mean age 16 ± 1.56 years divided into 4 groups (aerobic training, anaerobic training, leisure activities, and control. Subjects had a body mass index of 95% or more in relation to the 50th percentile. The aerobic program consisted of three ergometric bicycle sessions per week over a 3-month period (12 weeks and the activities were prescribed after determining the anaerobic ventilatory threshold (VO2 threshold. Anaerobic training was based on the Wingate anaerobic power test. The leisure program consisted of a varied range of activities (games, exercises, etc.. A nutritionist interviewed the members of these two groups and the control group every week in order to adapt them to the nutritional guidelines proposed for the study. The study showed that all three programs (aerobic exercise, anaerobic exercise and leisure activities were effective in reducing body mass. However, we found a significant reduction when analyzing the depression scores only for aerobic exercise (18.9 ± 9.33 to 10.6 ± 9.56 or 43.9% but no significant alterations for anaerobic exercise (11.36 ± 5.23 to 9.63 ± 4.78 or 15.22% and leisure (17.28 ± 7.55 to 15.07 ± 7.54 or 12.78%, thus indicating that in principle this type of activity could be included to improve emotional well-being of obese adolescent girls.

Classification of pharmacologic activity of a chemical compound is an essential step in any drug discovery process. We develop two new atom-centered fragment descriptors (vertex indices)--one based solely on topological considerations without discriminating atom or bond types, and another based on topological and electronic features. We also assess their usefulness by devising a method to rank and classify molecules with regard to their antibacterial activity. Classification performances of our method are found to be superior compared to two previous studies on large heterogeneous data sets for hit finding and hit-to-lead studies even though we use much fewer parameters. It is found that for hit finding studies topological features (simple graph) alone provide significant discriminating power, and for hit-to-lead process small but consistent improvement can be made by additionally including electronic features (colored graph). Our approach is simple, interpretable, and suitable for design of molecules as we do not use any physicochemical properties. The singular use of vertex index as descriptor, novel range based feature extraction, and rigorous statistical validation are the key elements of this study. PMID:24664120

To compare the juvenile arthritis disease activityscore (JADAS) based on C reactive protein (CRP) (JADAS-CRP) with JADAS based on erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) (JADAS-ESR) and to validate JADAS in a population-based setting.......To compare the juvenile arthritis disease activityscore (JADAS) based on C reactive protein (CRP) (JADAS-CRP) with JADAS based on erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) (JADAS-ESR) and to validate JADAS in a population-based setting....

Background This study aimed to develop a healthy eating motivation score and to determine if dietary, lifestyle and activity behaviours vary across levels of motivation to eat a healthy diet with a view to informing health promotion interventions. Methods A cross-sectional survey of food intake, physical activity, lifestyles and food choice attitudes was conducted in a nationally representative sample of 1262 adults in the Republic of Ireland aged 18 years and over. Results Increasing score f...

Full Text Available Objective: To assess whether changes in dietary intake and physical activity pattern are associated with the annual body mass index (BMI z-score change among adolescents. Methods: The study was conducted in public schools in the city of Piracicaba, Sao Paulo, Brazil, with a probabilistic sample of 431 adolescents participating in wave I (2004 (hereafter, baseline and 299 in wave II (2005 (hereafter, follow-up. BMI, usual food intake, physical activity, screen time, sexual maturation and demographic variables were assessed twice. The association between annual change in food intake, physical activity, screen time, and annual BMI z-score changes were assessed by multiple regression. Results: The study showed a positive variation in BMI z-score over one-year. Among variables related to physical activity pattern only playing videogame and using computer increased over the year. The intake of fruits and vegetables and sugar-sweetened beverages increased over one year, while the others variables showed a reduction. An increased consumption of fatty foods (β = 0.04, p = 0.04 and sweetened natural fruit juices (β = 0.05, p = 0.03 was positively associated with the rise in BMI z-score. Conclusions: Unhealthy dietary habits can predict the BMI z-score gain more than the physical activity pattern. The intake of fatty foods and sweetened fruit juices is associated with the BMI z-score over one year.

In this paper, we study a distribution-dependent correlation coefficient based on the concept of scalar score. This new measure of association of continuous random variables is compared by means of simulation experiments with the Pearson, Kendall and Spearman correlation coefficients.

MRI-scores of synovial membrane hypertrophy and bone erosions of the RA-wrist are introduced. Gadolinium-DTPA enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and conventional radiography (CR) of the wrist were performed in 16 patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and 3 healthy controls. A MRI-score of...... MRI and CR with respect to bone erosions. Bone erosions were detected by MRI in 14 wrists in contrast to only 6 wrists by CR. In all patients the erosions were more numerous on MRI. The introduced methods may be useful quantitative measures of synovitis and early joint destruction in RA....... synovial membrane hypertrophy was obtained by summation of gradings of synovial hypertrophy in 6 regions of the wrist. The score was significantly higher in wrists with than in wrists without clinical signs of active arthritis. The score was 0 in all healthy controls. Each bone of the wrist was assessed by...

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Atherosclerosis is the leading cause of cardiovascular disease (CVD. Traditional risk factors can be used to identify individuals at high risk for developing CVD and are generally associated with the extent of atherosclerosis; however, substantial numbers of individuals at low or intermediate risk still develop atherosclerosis. RESULTS: A case-control study was performed using microarray gene expression profiling of peripheral blood from 119 healthy women in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis cohort aged 50 or above. All participants had low (100 and carotid intima-media thickness (IMT >1.0 mm, whereas controls (N = 71 had CAC<10 and IMT <0.65 mm. We identified two major expression profiles significantly associated with significant atherosclerosis (odds ratio 4.85; P<0.001; among those with Framingham risk score <10%, the odds ratio was 5.30 (P<0.001. Ontology analysis of the gene signature reveals activation of a major innate immune pathway, toll-like receptors and IL-1R signaling, in individuals with significant atherosclerosis. CONCLUSION: Gene expression profiles of peripheral blood may be a useful tool to identify individuals with significant burden of atherosclerosis, even among those with low predicted risk by clinical factors. Furthermore, our data suggest an intimate connection between atherosclerosis and the innate immune system and inflammation via TLR signaling in lower risk individuals.

Objective. To validate the agreement between the 28-joint disease activityscore based on erythrocyte sedimentation rate (DAS28-ESR) and the 28-joint disease activityscore based on C-reactive protein (DAS28-CRP) in a group of Danish patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Methods. Data from 109...... Danish RA patients initiating biologic treatment were analysed at baseline and following one year of treatment. Participants were retrospectively enrolled from a previous cohort study and were considered eligible for this project if CRP and ESR were measured at baseline and at the follow-up visit. To...

Objective: To assess whether changes in dietary intake and physical activity pattern are associated with the annual body mass index (BMI) z-score change among adolescents. Methods: The study was conducted in public schools in the city of Piracicaba, Sao Paulo, Brazil, with a probabilistic sample of 431 adolescents participating in wave I (2004) (hereafter, baseline) and 299 in wave II (2005) (hereafter, follow-up). BMI, usual food intake, physical activity, screen time, sexual maturation and ...

The Annett Hand Preference Questionnaire (AHPQ) as modified by Briggs and Nebes was administered along with Carver and White's behavioural inhibition system (BIS) and behavioural activation system (BAS) scale and a shortened form of the Big Five personality questionnaire to 92 university students. After eliminating the data from five respondents who reported having changed handedness and one outlier, there was a significant sex difference in mean BIS scores, with females (n = 43) scoring higher than males (n = 43). Replicating the results of Wright, Hardie and Wilson, non-right-handers (n = 36) had significantly higher mean BIS score than right-handers (n = 50). Controlling for sex of participant, neuroticism and BAS sub-scale scores in hierarchical regression analyses left this BIS effect substantially unaffected. There was no handedness or sex difference on any of the three BAS sub-scales. Further analyses revealed no association between strength, as distinct from direction, of handedness and BIS (or BAS) scores. The findings are discussed with reference to recent developments in reinforcement sensitivity theory on which BIS/BAS variables are based. PMID:25697855

The aim of this study was to demonstrate that the addition of orbital magnetic resonance (MR) imaging can provide improvement in sensitivity of detection of active disease and the prediction of the response to intravenous glucocorticoid therapy (ivGC), over clinical activityscore (CAS) alone. A prospective case series was studied at our institution. Forty eight patients were examined by CAS and orbital MR imaging. The maximum of T2 relaxation times of extraocular muscles (maxT2RT) and other parameters were evaluated by MR imaging. Thirty five of 48 patients underwent ivGC. Twenty of 35 patients, whose CAS was 2 points or less, were evaluated for the response to ivGC. The correlation between CAS and maxT2RT was evaluated. Differentiation of active and inactive Graves' ophthalmopathy (GO) was performed by CAS and orbital MR imaging. The response to ivGC was evaluated by CAS, orbital MR imaging and ophthalmic parameters. As a result, CAS and maxT2RT showed significant positive correlation (r=0.58, p<0.0001), and 15 patients were positive by CAS and orbital MR imaging. However, 20 patients were positive by only MR imaging. In those 20 patients, there was significant improvement after ivGC. We concluded that orbital MR imaging combined with CAS could improve the sensitivity of detection of active disease and the prediction of the response to ivGC. In addition, even if only one parameter of CAS is positive, further examination with orbital MR imaging is advised. (author)

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES Although the association of body mass index (BMI) with metabolic syndrome (MetS) is well documented, there is little knowledge on the independent and joint associations of BMI and physical activity with MetS risk based on a continuous scoring system. This study was designed to explore the effect of physical activity on interactions between excess body weight and continuous metabolic syndrome (cMetS) in a nationwide survey of Iranian children and adolescents. SUBJECTS/METHODS Data on 5,625 school students between 10 and 18 years of age were analyzed. BMI percentiles, screen time activity (STA), leisure time physical activity (LTPA) levels, and components of cMetS risk score were extracted. Standardized residuals (z-scores) were calculated for MetS components. Linear regression models were used to study the interactions between different combinations of cMetS, LTPA, and BMI percentiles. RESULTS Overall, 984 (17.5%) subjects were underweight, whereas 501 (8.9%) and 451 (8%) participants were overweight and obese, respectively. All standardized values for cMetS components, except fasting blood glucose level, were directly correlated with BMI percentiles in all models (P-trend < 0.001); these associations were independent of STA and LTPA levels. Linear associations were also observed among LTPA and standardized residuals for blood pressure, high-density lipoprotein, and waist circumference (P-trend < 0.01). CONCLUSIONS Our findings suggest that BMI percentiles are associated with cMetS risk score independent of LTPA and STA levels. PMID:26244080

significance. Fetal breathing movements, amniotic fluid volume, and the non-stress test are the most powerful variables. For example, when the biophysical profile score is 2, the perinatal mortality varies between 428/1000 with only fetal movement present to 66/1000 if the non-stress test is reactive and all of the ultrasound parameters are absent (Manning 1990b. Some authors have, therefore, proposed utilization of a modified biophysical profile that incorporates only the non-stress test and amniotic fluid volume (Miller 1996. Although the positive predictive value of these 2 tests is equivalent to a biophysical profile score of 6, the perinatal mortality is still increased over a normal test score of 8 or 10 (Manning 1990b. The false positive rate with the modified biophysical profile score is also substantially higher. "nConclusions: The fetus expresses its well being or compromised status through a number of different biophysical activities that are controlled by different central nervous system centers. The utilization of the biophysical score for antepartum surveillance in high-risk patients has resulted in a reduction in perinatal mortality when compared to historical controls. The appropriate management of the viable fetus with an abnormal biophysical profile score may also decrease long-term neurological morbidity (Manning 1998. "nIt is unlikely that in the future additional variables will be added to the biophysical profile score. However, perhaps the incorporation of the fetal state (i.e., eye movements and Doppler flow studies of specific fetal vessels (umbilical artery, middle cerebral artery, ductus venosus will be incorporated into a complete assessment of the fetal condition "n "nTable 1. Components of the 30 Minute Biophysical Profile Score "nComponent "nDefinition "nFetal movements "n> 3 body or limb movements "nFetal tone "nOne episode of active extension and flexion of the limbs; opening and closing of hand "nFetal breathing movements "n>1 episode of >30

Objectives To better understand the effectiveness of xylitol in caries prevention in adults, and to attempt improved clinical trial efficiency. Methods As part of the Xylitol for Adult Caries Trial (X-ACT), non-cavitated and cavitated caries lesions were assessed in subjects who were experiencing the disease. The trial was a test of the effectiveness of 5 grams/day of xylitol, consumed by dissolving in the mouth five 1 gram lozenges spaced across each day, compared with a sucralose placebo. For this analysis, seeking trial efficiency, 538 subjects aged 21–80, with complete data for four dental examinations were selected from the 691 randomized into the three year trial, conducted at three sites. Acceptable inter and intra examiner reliability before and during the trial was quantified using the kappa statistic. Results The mean annualized non-cavitated plus cavitated lesion transition scores in coronal and root surfaces, from sound to carious favoured xylitol over placebo, during the three cumulative periods of 12, 24, and 33 months, but these clinically and statistically non-significant differences declined in magnitude over time. Restricting the present assessment to those subjects with a higher baseline lifetime caries experience showed possible but inconsistent benefit. Conclusions There was no clear and clinically relevant preventive effect of xylitol on caries in adults with adequate fluoride exposure when non-cavitated plus cavitated lesions were assessed. This conformed to the X-ACT trial result assessing cavitated lesions. Including non-cavitated lesion assessment in this full scale, placebo controlled, multi site, randomized, double blinded clinical trial in adults experiencing dental caries, did not achieve added trial efficiency or demonstrate practical benefit of xylitol. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.Gov NCT00393055 PMID:24205951

Aim The aim of the study was to assess serum levels of interleukin (IL)-18 and IL-10 in systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) patients and their relationship with disease activity. Patients and methods Thirty patients with SLE and 20 healthy controls were investigated in this study. The serum IL-18 and IL-10 levels were determined using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and their correlations with the disease activity were measured using the Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Disease Activi...

Scoring rules are an important tool for evaluating the performance of probabilistic forecasts. A popular example is the Brier score, which allows for a decomposition into terms related to the sharpness (or information content) and to the reliability of the forecast. This feature renders the Brier score a very intuitive measure of forecast quality. In this paper, it is demonstrated that all strictly proper scoring rules allow for a similar decomposition into reliability and sharpness related terms. This finding underpins the importance of proper scores and yields further credence to the practice of measuring forecast quality by proper scores. Furthermore, the effect of averaging multiple probabilistic forecasts on the score is discussed. It is well known that the Brier score of a mixture of several forecasts is never worse that the average score of the individual forecasts. This property hinges on the convexity of the Brier score, a property not universal among proper scores. Arguably, this phenomenon portends...

Full Text Available Health-related quality of life (HRQL for nursing home residents is important, however, the concept of quality of life is broad, encompasses many domains and is difficult to assess in people with dementia. Basic activities of daily living (ADL are measured routinely in nursing homes using the Resident Assessment Instrument-Minimum Data Set Version 2.0 (RAI-MDS and Functional Independence Measure (FIM instrument. We examined the relationship between HRQL and ADL to assess the future possibility of ADL dependency level serving as a surrogate measure of HRQL in residents with dementia. To assess ADL, measures derived from the RAI-MDS and FIM data were gathered for 111 residents at the beginning of our study and at 6-month follow-up. Higher scores for independence in ADL were correlated with higher scores for a disease-specific HRQL measure, the Quality of Life—Alzheimer’s Disease Scale. Preliminary evidence suggests that FIM-assessed ADL is associated with HRQL for these residents. The associations of the dressing and toileting items with HRQL were particularly strong. This finding suggests the importance of ADL function in HRQL. The RAI-MDS ADL scales should be used with caution to evaluate HRQL.

Publishers of sheet music are generally reluctant in distributing their content via the Internet. Although online sheet music distribution's advantages are numerous the potential risk of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) infringement, e.g. illegal online distributions, disables any innovation propensity. While active protection techniques only deter external risk factors, additional technology is necessary to adequately treat further risk factors. For several media types including music scores watermarking technology has been developed, which ebeds information in data by suitable data modifications. Furthermore, fingerprinting or perceptual hasing methods have been developed and are being applied especially for audio. These methods allow the identification of content without prior modifications. In this article we motivate the development of watermarking and fingerprinting technologies for sheet music. Outgoing from potential limitations of watermarking methods we explain why fingerprinting methods are important for sheet music and address potential applications. Finally we introduce a condept for fingerprinting of sheet music.

Full Text Available To translate the English version of Tegner ActivityScore into a Simplified-Chinese version (Tegner-C and evaluate its psychometric properties.Tegner-C was cross-culturally adapted according to established guidelines. The validity and reliability of Tegner-C were assessed in 78 participants, with 19-20 participants in each of the four groups: before anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (pre-ACLR group, 2-3 months after ACLR group, 3-12 months after ACLR group, and healthy control group. Each participant was asked to complete the Tegner-C and Chinese version of International Knee Documentation Committee Subjective Knee Form (IKDC-SKF-C twice, with an interval of 5±2 days. Intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC2, 1 was used to assess the reliability and Spearman's rank correlation was used for construct validity.The ICC2,1 was higher than 0.90 for all groups except in the pre-ACLR group, for which the ICC2,1 was 0.71 (0.41, 0.87 (All with p<0.001. The absolute reliability as evaluated by the smallest detectable change was 0.43, 2.12, 0.89, and 0.44 for the healthy control group, pre-ACLR group, 2-3 months after ACLR group, and 3-12 months after ACLR group, respectively. Neither a ceiling effect nor a floor effect was observed for any group. Significant difference was observed for both Tegner-C and IKDC-SKF-C scores between the control and the other three groups (all with p<0.001, and between pre-ACLR and the 2-3 months after ACLR group (p<0.001.Tegner-C demonstrated comparable psychometric properties to the original English version and thus is reliable and valid for Chinese-speaking patients with ACL injury.

Full Text Available The implementation of new treatment strategies based on current recommendations has enabled a greater number of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA to achieve remission. However, there are no definite predictors of sustained remission. Moreover, the absence of clear consensus on the time of withdrawal or reduction of treatment further adds to the treatment burden. This pilot study was intended to evaluate the prognostic potential of various RA-related parameters. All the enrolled subjects (n=124 were clinically evaluated on the basis of various parameters including age, gender, duration of illness before the initiation of disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs, tender and swollen joints (28 joints, erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR, C-reactive protein (CRP, hemoglobin percentage, lymphocyte count, total white-blood cell counts, and neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio (NLR. Student’s t-test and discriminant function analysis were performed. The specificity of all parameters and their best possible cut-off to predict relapse were calculated using the receiver operating characteristic (ROC analysis. A significant difference in terms of pain perception, NLR, tendency to have a significant tender joint count and absolute lymphocyte counts was identified between the patients in sustained remission and those in relapse. The ROC analysis indicated that NLR was consistent in predicting remission. CRP, ESR, and/or disease activityscore may not be very effective in differentiating patients with sustainable remission/low disease activity. NLR along with patient’s perception of pain may assist in predicting sustained remission.

Aims To translate the English version of Tegner ActivityScore into a Simplified-Chinese version (Tegner-C) and evaluate its psychometric properties. Methods Tegner-C was cross-culturally adapted according to established guidelines. The validity and reliability of Tegner-C were assessed in 78 participants, with 19–20 participants in each of the four groups: before anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (pre-ACLR) group, 2–3 months after ACLR group, 3–12 months after ACLR group, and healthy control group. Each participant was asked to complete the Tegner-C and Chinese version of International Knee Documentation Committee Subjective Knee Form (IKDC-SKF-C) twice, with an interval of 5±2 days. Intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC2, 1) was used to assess the reliability and Spearman’s rank correlation was used for construct validity. Results The ICC2,1 was higher than 0.90 for all groups except in the pre-ACLR group, for which the ICC2,1 was 0.71 (0.41, 0.87) (All with pACL injury. PMID:27186880

In educational assessment, overall scores obtained by simply averaging a number of domain scores are sometimes reported. However, simply averaging the domain scores ignores the fact that different domains have different score points, that scores from those domains are related, and that at different score points the relationship between overall…

Stroke is the leading cause of disability for adults. Handicap assessment is required to improve follow-up and for clinical trials. The modified Rankin scale is a "best-seller" which has contributed to prove efficacy of thrombolysis. This global score of disability is simple and patient-oriented. It seems interesting to developp such global scoring for aphasia. Our aim was to validate a simple and reproductible tool for handicap due to every type of aphasia. Aphasia Handicap Score (AHS) was d...

Background: This study was carried out in Guinea-Bissau's capital Bissau among inpatients and outpatients attending for tuberculosis (TB) treatment within the study area of the Bandim Health Project, a Health and Demographic Surveillance Site. Our aim was to assess the variability between 2...... physicians in performing the Bandim tuberculosis score (TBscore), a clinical severity score for pulmonary TB (PTB), and to compare it to the Karnofsky performance score (KPS). Method: From December 2008 to July 2009 we assessed the TBscore and the KPS of 100 PTB patients at inclusion in the TB cohort and...

The widespread interest in sports in our culture provides an excellent opportunity to catch students' attention in mathematics and statistics classes. One mathematically interesting aspect of volleyball, which can be used to motivate students, is the scoring system. (MM)

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: Knowing the potential for and limitations of information generated using different evaluation instruments favors the development of more accurate functional diagnoses and therapeutic decision-making. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the relationship between the number of compensatory movements when climbing up and going down stairs, age, functional classification and time taken to perform a tested activity (TA of going up and down stairs in boys with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD. METHOD: A bank of movies featuring 30 boys with DMD performing functional activities was evaluated. Compensatory movements were assessed using the climbing up and going down stairs domain of the Functional Evaluation Scale for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (FES-DMD; age in years; functional classification using the Vignos Scale (VS, and TA using a timer. Statistical analyses were performed using the Spearman correlation test. RESULTS: There is a moderate relationship between the climbing up stairs domain of the FES-DMD and age (r=0.53, p=0.004 and strong relationships with VS (r=0.72, p=0.001 and TA for this task (r=0.83, p<0.001. There were weak relationships between the going down stairs domain of the FES-DMD-going down stairs with age (r=0.40, p=0.032, VS (r=0.65, p=0.002 and TA for this task (r=0.40, p=0.034. CONCLUSION: These findings indicate that the evaluation of compensatory movements used when climbing up stairs can provide more relevant information about the evolution of the disease, although the activity of going down stairs should be investigated, with the aim of enriching guidance and strengthening accident prevention. Data from the FES-DMD, age, VS and TA can be used in a complementary way to formulate functional diagnoses. Longitudinal studies and with broader age groups may supplement this information.

In this study, we investigated the correlation between the serum fatty acid composition and hepatic steatosis, inflammation, hepatocellular ballooning scores, and liver fatty acids composition in mice fed a high-fat diet. Livers were collected for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease score analysis. Fatty acid compositions were analysed by gas chromatography. Correlations were determined by Pearson correlation coefficient. Exposed to a high-fat diet, mice developed fatty liver disease with varying severity without fibrosis. The serum fatty acid variation became more severe with prolonged exposure to a high-fat diet. This variation also correlated significantly with the variation in livers, with the types of fatty acids corresponding to liver steatosis, inflammation, and hepatocellular ballooning scores. Results of this study lead to the following hypothesis: the extent of serum fatty acid variation may be a preliminary biomarker of fatty liver disease caused by high-fat intake. PMID:27179602

Abstract Background Many Australian children are insufficiently active to accrue health benefits and physical activity (PA) levels are consistently lower among youth of low socio-economic position. PA levels decline dramatically during adolescence and evidence suggests that competency in a range of fundamental movement skills (FMS) may serve as a protective factor against this trend. Methods/design The Supporting Children’s Outcomes Using Rewards Exercise and Skills (SCORES) intervention is a...

Get to grips with a new technology, understand what it is and what it can do for you, and then get to work with the most important features and tasks. Instant MuseScore is written in an easy-to follow format, packed with illustrations that will help you get started with this music composition software.This book is for musicians who would like to learn how to notate music digitally with MuseScore. Readers should already have some knowledge about musical terminology; however, no prior experience with music notation software is necessary.

Background Subjective assessment tools such as visual analog scales (VAS) or pain scores are commonly used to evaluate the intensity of chronic cancer-induced pain.However,their value is limited in some cases.We measured changes in VAS pain scores and salivary a-amylase (sAA) concentrations in cancer patients receiving radiotherapy for bone metastases to ascertain the correlation between these measures.Methods We enrolled 30 patients with bone metastases attending a single institution from June 2010 to March 2011.All patients with cancer-induced bone pain received radiation therapy (RT) at the same dose (30 Gy) and fractionation (3 Gy/ fraction,5 days/week) for palliative pain relief.We assessed heart rate (HR),systolic and diastolic blood pressures (DBP/SBP) and VAS pain scores before (d0) and after five (d5) and ten fractions (d10) of irradiation,sAA and salivary cortisol (SC)concentrations were measured using a portable analyzer and automated chemiluminescence analyzer,respectively.Results Radiotherapy markedly decreased VAS scores from (82.93±9.29) to (31.43±t16.73) mm (P ＜0.001) and sAA concentrations from (109.40±26.38) to (36.03±19.40) U/ml (P ＜0.001).Moreover,there was a significant correlation between these two indices (P ＜0.01,r=0.541).HR decreased by 6.5％ after radiotherapy,but did not correlate with VAS scores (P ＞0.05).SC concentrations and BP did not change significantly during the study (P ＞0.05).Conclusions The significant correlation between sAA concentrations and VAS pain scores identified in these preliminary results suggests that this biomarker may be a valuable,noninvasive and sensitive index for the objective assessment of pain intensity in patients with cancer-induced bone pain.

We developed scoring procedures to convert screener responses to estimates of individual dietary intake for fruits and vegetables, dairy, added sugars, whole grains, fiber, and calcium using the What We Eat in America 24-hour dietary recall data from the 2003-2006 NHANES.

There is little evidence on the relationship between leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) and built environment in Brazil, especially in areas of low socioeconomic status. The objective of this study was to describe indicators of built environment score related to LTPA for adults living in a region of low socioeconomic status. We conducted a cross-sectional study of 767 adults living in Ermelino Matarazzo district in São Paulo, 2007. The dependent variable was the practice of LTPA (in minute...

The thesis is a film composition scoring for the animated documentary film Sticky directed and produced by Jilli Rose, 2013. The film is 20 minutes long and talking about an expedition to the Ball's Pyramid Island, Australia, and the discovery of the stick insect－a type of phasmid which has disappeared on the Lord Howe Island, Australia since 1920, and how to rescue it and preserve it. The music is mainly composed based on orchestra and combining some electronic synthesis instruments with e...

Full Text Available Abstract Background Clinical guidelines for the management of back pain frequently recommend 'manual therapy' as a first line intervention, with psychosocial screening and 'active rehabilitation' for those not improving at 6 weeks post onset. The potential for psychosocial factors to predict treatment response and therefore outcome has not been adequately explored. The purpose of this pilot study was to determine the feasibility of a study to compare manual therapy and active rehabilitation outcomes for subjects with sub-acute/chronic back pain, investigate whether any difference in outcome was related to psychosocial factors, and to inform the design of a main study. Methods A convenience sample of 39 patients with non-specific low back pain referred to the physiotherapy department of an acute NHS Trust hospital was recruited over a nine month period. Patients completed the Linton and Hallden psychological screening questionnaire (LH and were allocated to a low LH (105 or below or high LH (106 or above scoring group. The low or high LH score was used to sequentially allocate patients to one of two treatment groups – Manual Therapy comprising physiotherapy based on manual means as chosen by the treating therapist or Active Rehabilitation comprising a progressive exercise and education programme – with the first low LH scoring patient being allocated to active rehabilitation and the next to manual therapy and so on. Treatment was administered for eight sessions over a four-week period and outcome measures were taken at baseline and at four weeks. Measures used were the Roland Morris Questionnaire (RMQ, two components of the Short Form McGill (total pain rating index [PRI] and pain intensity via visual analogue scale [VAS], and the LH. Results The manual therapy group demonstrated a greater treatment effect compared with active rehabilitation for RMQ (mean difference 3.6, 95% CI 1.1 – 6.2, p = 0.006 and PRI (7.1, 95% CI 2.0 – 12.2, p = 0

Examines empirically the efficacy of utilizing Olympic diving and gymnastic scoring systems for grading graduate students' English compositions. Results indicated that such scoring rules do not produce ratings different in reliability or in level from conventional letter grades. (ED)

Empirical scoring functions used in protein-ligand docking calculations are typically trained on a dataset of complexes with known affinities with the aim of generalizing across different docking applications. We report a novel method of scoring-function optimization that supports the use of additional information to constrain scoring function parameters, which can be used to focus a scoring function’s training towards a particular application, such as screening enrichment. The approach combi...

Full Text Available Background. There is a need for tools to assess dependency among persons with severe impairments. Objectives. The aim was to compare the Functional Independence Measure (FIM and the Northwick Park Dependency Score (NPDS, in a sample from in-patient rehabilitation. Material and Methods. Data from 115 persons (20 to 65 years of age with neurological impairments was gathered. Analyses were made of sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value. Agreement of the scales was assessed with kappa and concordance with Goodman-Kruskal’s gamma. Scale structures were explored using the Rank-Transformable Pattern of Agreement (RTPA. Content validation was performed. Results. The sensitivity of the NPDS as compared to FIM varied between 0.53 (feeding and 1.0 (mobility and specificity between 0.64 (mobility and 1.0 (bladder. The positive predictive value varied from 0.62 (mobility to 1.0 (bladder, and the negative predictive value varied from 0.48 (bowel to 1.0 (mobility. Agreement between the scales was moderate to good (four items and excellent (three items. Concordance was good, with a gamma of −.856, an asymptotic error (ase of .025, and P

A rising need for workers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields has fueled interest in improving teaching within STEM disciplines. Numerous studies have demonstrated the benefits of active learning approaches on student learning outcomes. However, many of these studies have been conducted in experimental, rather than real-life class, settings. In addition, most of these studies have focused on in-class active learning exercises. This study tested the effects of ans...

Full Text Available It is generally easier to predict defaults accurately if a large data set (including defaults is available for estimating the prediction model. This puts not only small banks, which tend to have smaller data sets, at disadvantage. It can also pose a problem for large banks that began to collect their own historical data only recently, or banks that recently introduced a new rating system. We used a Bayesian methodology that enables banks with small data sets to improve their default probability. Another advantage of the Bayesian method is that it provides a natural way for dealing with structural differences between a bank’s internal data and additional, external data. In practice, the true scoring function may differ across the data sets, the small internal data set may contain information that is missing in the larger external data set, or the variables in the two data sets are not exactly the same but related. Bayesian method can handle such kind of problem.

The goal of this lesson plan is for second-grade students to understand the steps in how food is made and delivered to the grocery store. Students create a play where each person plays a part in the production and distribution of food. The lesson suggests that the class perform the play on parents' night. It provides five activities for students…

The System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time (SOFIT) is a direct observation system specifically developed for use during physical education (PE; McKenzie, 1991; McKenzie, Sallis, & Nader, 1991). The purpose of this study was to validate the estimates of time spent in various physical activity intensities obtained with the paper and pencil…

Full Text Available Abstract Background Pharmacological and genetic studies suggest the importance of the dopaminergic, serotonergic, and noradrenergic systems in the pathogenesis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD and Disruptive Behavior Disorder (DBD. We have, in a population-based sample, studied associations between dimensions of the ADHD/DBD phenotype and Monoamine Oxidase B (MAO-B activity in platelets and polymorphisms in two serotonergic genes: the Monoamine Oxidase A Variable Number of Tandem Repeats (MAO-A VNTR and the 5-Hydroxytryptamine Transporter gene-Linked Polymorphic Region (5-HTT LPR. Methods A population-based sample of twins, with an average age of 16 years, was assessed for ADHD/DBD with a clinical interview; Kiddie Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School-Age Children-Present and Lifetime Version (K-SADS-PL. Blood was drawn from 247 subjects and analyzed for platelet MAO-B activity and polymorphisms in the MAO-A and 5-HTT genes. Results We found an association in girls between low platelet MAO-B activity and symptoms of Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD. In girls, there was also an association between the heterozygote long/short 5-HTT LPR genotype and symptoms of conduct disorder. Furthermore the heterozygote 5-HTT LPR genotype in boys was found to be associated with symptoms of Conduct Disorder (CD. In boys, hemizygosity for the short MAO-A VNTR allele was associated with disruptive behavior. Conclusion Our study suggests that the serotonin system, in addition to the dopamine system, should be further investigated when studying genetic influences on the development of Disruptive Behavior Disorders.

The private market of student loans has become an important source of college financing in the U.S. Unlike government student loans, the terms on private student loans (i.e., credit limits and interest rates) are based on credit scores We quantify the effects of credit scores on college investment in a heterogeneous life-cycle economy that exhibits a government and private market for student loans. We find that students with higher credit scores invest in more college education. Furthermore, ...

distinguish rival prediction models with similar prediction performances. Furthermore, on the subject level a confidence score may provide useful supplementary information for new patients who want to base a medical decision on predicted risk. The ideas are illustrated and discussed using data from cancer...... modelling strategy is applied to different training sets. For each modelling strategy we estimate a confidence score based on the same repeated bootstraps. A new decomposition of the expected Brier score is obtained, as well as the estimates of population average confidence scores. The latter can be used to...

This article provides an introduction to the kind of computer software that is used to score student writing in some high stakes testing programs, and that is being promoted as a teaching and learning tool to schools. It sketches the state of play with machines for the scoring of writing, and describes how these machines work and what they do.…

Given that equating/linking applications are now appearing in kinesiology literature, this article provides an overview of the different types of linked test scores: equated, concordant, and predicted. It also addresses the different types of evidence required to determine whether the scores from two different field tests (measuring the same…

Full Text Available Abstract Background Many Australian children are insufficiently active to accrue health benefits and physical activity (PA levels are consistently lower among youth of low socio-economic position. PA levels decline dramatically during adolescence and evidence suggests that competency in a range of fundamental movement skills (FMS may serve as a protective factor against this trend. Methods/design The Supporting Children’s Outcomes Using Rewards Exercise and Skills (SCORES intervention is a multi-component PA and FMS intervention for primary schools in low-income communities, which will be evaluated using a group randomized controlled trial. The socio-ecological model provided a framework for the 12-month intervention, which includes the following components: teacher professional learning, student leadership workshops (including leadership accreditation and rewards, e.g., stickers, water bottles, PA policy review, PA equipment packs, parental engagement via newsletters, FMS homework and a parent evening, and community partnerships with local sporting organizations. Outcomes will be assessed at baseline, 6- and 12-months. The primary outcomes are PA (accelerometers, FMS (Test of Gross Motor Development II and cardiorespiratory fitness (multi-stage fitness test. Secondary outcomes include body mass index [using weight (kg/height (m2], perceived competence, physical self-esteem, and resilience. Individual and environmental mediators of behavior change (e.g. social support and enjoyment will also be assessed. The System for Observing Fitness Instruction Time will be used to assess the impact of the intervention on PA within physical education lessons. Statistical analyses will follow intention-to-treat principles and hypothesized mediators of PA behavior change will be explored. Discussion SCORES is an innovative primary school-based PA and FMS intervention designed to support students attending schools in low-income communities to be more skilled

Introduction Induction of labor represents initiation of uterine contractions before their spontaneous onset. The aim of the study was to establish the role of Bishop score in prediction of labor induction in routine clinical work. Material and methods The study was a prospective blind, observational one. All patients had a vaginal examination prior to induction, during which Bishop score was evaluated. The mode of induction was either intravenous infusion of oxytocin or endovaginal prostagla...

We introduce a measure for the level of stability against coalitional deviations, called \\emph{stability scores}, which generalizes widely used notions of stability in non-cooperative games. We use the proposed measure to compare various Nash equilibria in congestion games, and to quantify the effect of game parameters on coalitional stability. For our main results, we apply stability scores to analyze and compare the Generalized Second Price (GSP) and Vickrey-Clarke-Groves (VCG) ad auctions....

Rasch models provide a framework for measurement and modelling latent variables. Having measured a latent variable in a population a comparison of groups will often be of interest. For this purpose the use of observed raw scores will often be inadequate because these lack interval scale propertie....... This paper compares two approaches to group comparison: linear regression models using estimated person locations as outcome variables and latent regression models based on the distribution of the score....

Introduced in the 70´s, the use of credit scoring techniques became widespread in the 90´s thanks to the development of better statistical and computational resources. Nowadays almost all the financial intermediaries use these techniques, at least to originate the credits they grant. Credit scoring models are algorithms that in a mechanical way assess the credit risk of a loan applicant or an existing bank client, by means of statistical, mathematic, econometric or artificial intelligence dev...

This study seeks to describe the predictive value of the signal intensity ratio (SIR) in magnetic resonance imaging-turbo inversion recovery magnitude (MRI-TIRM) in patients with Graves' orbitopathy (GO) with regard to predictability of therapy response. Included in this prospective pilot study were 36 consecutive patients with GO and 25 control subjects. Patients were clinically assessed according to the European Group on Graves' Orbitopathy recommendations with active GO defined by a clinical activityscore (CAS) ≥ 3. On magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, muscle inflammation was measured with a region of interest set within the brightest extra-ocular muscle both on coronal turbo inversion recovery magnitude (TIRM) and on fat suppressed gadolinium-enhanced T1-weighted sequences. To calculate the SIR, the measured signal intensity was set in proportion to that of the ipsilateral temporalis muscle. Signal intensity ratio in coronal T2-weighted TIRM sequences in either group ranged from 1.22 to 4.92 (mean 2.04) in patients with GO and from 1.18 to 2.4 (mean 1.63) in controls without GO. The observed differences were significant on the TIRM sequences (right eye p = 0.023; left eye p = 0.022), whereas, no significant differences could be detected on the T1-weighted sequences (right eye p = 0.396; left eye p = 0.498). A cut off value of SIR > 2.5 for a CAS ≥ 4 to discriminate active from inactive patients was statistically calculated. T2 relaxation time is a reliable tool in detecting active GO. The difference in T2-SIR versus T1-SIR is helpful to distinguish inflammatory oedema of the extra ocular muscles from intra-orbital congestion due to reduced venous outflow. (orig.)

This study seeks to describe the predictive value of the signal intensity ratio (SIR) in magnetic resonance imaging-turbo inversion recovery magnitude (MRI-TIRM) in patients with Graves' orbitopathy (GO) with regard to predictability of therapy response. Included in this prospective pilot study were 36 consecutive patients with GO and 25 control subjects. Patients were clinically assessed according to the European Group on Graves' Orbitopathy recommendations with active GO defined by a clinical activityscore (CAS) {>=} 3. On magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, muscle inflammation was measured with a region of interest set within the brightest extra-ocular muscle both on coronal turbo inversion recovery magnitude (TIRM) and on fat suppressed gadolinium-enhanced T1-weighted sequences. To calculate the SIR, the measured signal intensity was set in proportion to that of the ipsilateral temporalis muscle. Signal intensity ratio in coronal T2-weighted TIRM sequences in either group ranged from 1.22 to 4.92 (mean 2.04) in patients with GO and from 1.18 to 2.4 (mean 1.63) in controls without GO. The observed differences were significant on the TIRM sequences (right eye p = 0.023; left eye p = 0.022), whereas, no significant differences could be detected on the T1-weighted sequences (right eye p = 0.396; left eye p = 0.498). A cut off value of SIR > 2.5 for a CAS {>=} 4 to discriminate active from inactive patients was statistically calculated. T2 relaxation time is a reliable tool in detecting active GO. The difference in T2-SIR versus T1-SIR is helpful to distinguish inflammatory oedema of the extra ocular muscles from intra-orbital congestion due to reduced venous outflow. (orig.)

A central problem in de novo drug design is determining the binding affinity of a ligand with a receptor. A new scoring algorithm is presented that estimates the binding affinity of a protein-ligand complex given a three-dimensional structure. The method, LISA (Ligand Identification Scoring Algorithm), uses an empirical scoring function to describe the binding free energy. Interaction terms have been designed to account for van der Waals (VDW) contacts, hydrogen bonding, desolvation effects and metal chelation to model the dissociation equilibrium constants using a linear model. Atom types have been introduced to differentiate the parameters for VDW, H-bonding interactions and metal chelation between different atom pairs. A training set of 492 protein-ligand complexes was selected for the fitting process. Different test sets have been examined to evaluate its ability to predict experimentally measured binding affinities. By comparing with other well known scoring functions, the results show that LISA has advantages over many existing scoring functions in simulating protein-ligand binding affinity, especially metalloprotein-ligand binding affinity. Artificial Neural Network (ANN) was also used in order to demonstrate that the energy terms in LISA are well designed and do not require extra cross terms. PMID:21561101

Preinstruction SAT scores and normalized gains (G) on the force concept inventory (FCI) were examined for individual students in interactive engagement (IE) courses in introductory mechanics at one high school (N=335) and one university (N=292), and strong, positive correlations were found for both populations (r=0.57 and r=0.46, respectively).…

Forty-one patients with systemic sclerosis were investigated with a new and simple skin score method measuring the degree of thickening and pliability in seven regions together with area involvement in each region. The highest values were, as expected, found in diffuse cutaneous systemic sclerosis...... (type III SS) and the lowest in limited cutaneous systemic sclerosis (type I SS) with no lesions extending above wrists and ancles. A positive correlation was found to the aminoterminal propeptide of type III procollagen, a serological marker for synthesis of type III collagen. The skin score is...

Argues that economics education provides many benefits to students, including preparation for law school. Examines the ranking of economics majors on the Law School Admission Test (LSAT). Finds that among the 14 majors having more than 2,000 students take the LSAT, economics students received the highest average score. (DSK)

Objective: To construct a score that allows prediction of major depressive episode (MDE) persistence in individuals with MDE using determinants of persistence identified in previous research. Method: Data were derived from 250 subjects from the general population with new MDE according to DSM-III-R.

Full Text Available Introduction Induction of labor represents initiation of uterine contractions before their spontaneous onset. The aim of the study was to establish the role of Bishop score in prediction of labor induction in routine clinical work. Material and methods The study was a prospective blind, observational one. All patients had a vaginal examination prior to induction, during which Bishop score was evaluated. The mode of induction was either intravenous infusion of oxytocin or endovaginal prostaglandins. The induction was considered successful if vaginal delivery took place within 24 hours from the onset of induction. Results There were 100 patients, and induction was successful in 74% and unsuccessful in 26%. Mean Bishop score in group A was 5.65 (SD 1.40, 95% CI 5.27 - 6.03, and in group B 4.15 (SD 1.04, 95% CI 3.66 - 4.63 (p < 0.01. Statistical analysis of the area under the ROC curve showed that Bishop score is a good and reliable predictor of the outcome of labor induction (0.816, 95% CI od 0.710 - 0.896, with the best statistical performances at the cut-off value of 5 (sensitivity 65.5% specificity 95%, PPV 97.3%, NPV 50%. Conclusion In our study Bishop score proved to be a reliable and good method for prediction of the outcome of pregnancy if a single, experienced operator evaluates it, with best statistical performances at the cut-off value more than 5 (sensitivity 65.5%, specificity 95%, PPV 97.3%, NPV 50%. The next step would be introduction of more operators, of different skills and experience and subsequent further testing of the method in different conditions.

Traumatic injuries frequently lead to infection, organ failure, and death. Health care providers rely on several injury scoring systems to quantify the extent of injury and to help predict clinical outcome. Physiological, anatomical, and clinical laboratory analytic scoring systems (Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation [APACHE], Injury Severity Score [ISS]) are utilized, with limited success, to predict outcome following injury. The recent development of techniques for measuring the expression level of all of a person’s genes simultaneously may make it possible to develop an injury scoring system based on the degree of gene activation. We hypothesized that a peripheral blood leukocyte gene expression score could predict outcome, including multiple organ failure, following severe blunt trauma. To test such a scoring system, we measured gene expression of peripheral blood leukocytes from patients within 12 h of traumatic injury. cRNA derived from whole blood leukocytes obtained within 12 h of injury provided gene expression data for the entire genome that were used to create a composite gene expression score for each patient. Total blood leukocytes were chosen because they are active during inflammation, which is reflective of poor outcome. The gene expression score combines the activation levels of all the genes into a single number which compares the patient’s gene expression to the average gene expression in uninjured volunteers. Expression profiles from healthy volunteers were averaged to create a reference gene expression profile which was used to compute a difference from reference (DFR) score for each patient. This score described the overall genomic response of patients within the first 12 h following severe blunt trauma. Regression models were used to compare the association of the DFR, APACHE, and ISS scores with outcome. We hypothesized that patients with a total gene response more different from uninjured volunteers would tend to have poorer

Team performance is a ubiquitous area of inquiry in the social sciences, and it motivates the problem of team selection -- choosing the members of a team for maximum performance. Influential work of Hong and Page has argued that testing individuals in isolation and then assembling the highest-scoring ones into a team is not an effective method for team selection. For a broad class of performance measures, based on the expected maximum of random variables representing individual candidates, we...

Full Text Available Preinstruction SAT scores and normalized gains (G on the force concept inventory (FCI were examined for individual students in interactive engagement (IE courses in introductory mechanics at one high school (N=335 and one university (N=292 , and strong, positive correlations were found for both populations ( r=0.57 and r=0.46 , respectively. These correlations are likely due to the importance of cognitive skills and abstract reasoning in learning physics. The larger correlation coefficient for the high school population may be a result of the much shorter time interval between taking the SAT and studying mechanics, because the SAT may provide a more current measure of abilities when high school students begin the study of mechanics than it does for college students, who begin mechanics years after the test is taken. In prior research a strong correlation between FCI G and scores on Lawson’s Classroom Test of Scientific Reasoning for students from the same two schools was observed. Our results suggest that, when interpreting class average normalized FCI gains and comparing different classes, it is important to take into account the variation of students’ cognitive skills, as measured either by the SAT or by Lawson’s test. While Lawson’s test is not commonly given to students in most introductory mechanics courses, SAT scores provide a readily available alternative means of taking account of students’ reasoning abilities. Knowing the students’ cognitive level before instruction also allows one to alter instruction or to use an intervention designed to improve students’ cognitive level.

Preinstruction SAT scores and normalized gains (G) on the force concept inventory (FCI) were examined for individual students in interactive engagement (IE) courses in introductory mechanics at one high school (N=335) and one university (N=292) , and strong, positive correlations were found for both populations ( r=0.57 and r=0.46 , respectively). These correlations are likely due to the importance of cognitive skills and abstract reasoning in learning physics. The larger correlation coefficient for the high school population may be a result of the much shorter time interval between taking the SAT and studying mechanics, because the SAT may provide a more current measure of abilities when high school students begin the study of mechanics than it does for college students, who begin mechanics years after the test is taken. In prior research a strong correlation between FCI G and scores on Lawson’s Classroom Test of Scientific Reasoning for students from the same two schools was observed. Our results suggest that, when interpreting class average normalized FCI gains and comparing different classes, it is important to take into account the variation of students’ cognitive skills, as measured either by the SAT or by Lawson’s test. While Lawson’s test is not commonly given to students in most introductory mechanics courses, SAT scores provide a readily available alternative means of taking account of students’ reasoning abilities. Knowing the students’ cognitive level before instruction also allows one to alter instruction or to use an intervention designed to improve students’ cognitive level.

The HEART score was developed to improve risk stratification in chest pain patients in the emergency department (ED). This thesis describes series of validation studies of the HEART score and sub studies for individual elements of the score. The predictive value of the HEART score for the occurrence

Introduction Ankylosing Spondylitis (AS) with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) therapeutic failure is treated with biologics. Aim To compare the clinical outcomes of different biologics for Asian Indian patients with AS who have NSAID therapeutic failure. Materials and Methods Thirty-five AS patients with NSAID failure were administered Etanercept (n=15) (50mg SQ, weekly) or Infliximab (n=20) (5mg/kg IV every 2nd month) based on patient convenience or physician discretion as per 2015 ACR/SAA/SPARTAN recommendations. Baseline demographic details, time to diagnosis, disease duration, presence of low backache, early morning stiffness, peripheral joint and extraarticular involvement, ESR, CRP values and HLA-B27 score were obtained. Baseline values of scores of BASMI-3 and MASES were calculated. To monitor the disease activity, BASDAI and ASDAS-ESR scores were recorded at baseline, and after 6 months and 12 months of therapy initiation. Statistical Analysis Comparison of means: independent samples t-test; comparison of parameters over time: repeated measures ANOVA. Results Both groups were comparable in all parameters at therapy initiation except in the baseline BASMI-3 score which was significantly higher in patients who received Etanercept. Over 12 months of treatment, the reduction in disease activity, as evidenced by reduction in the mean BASDAI and ASDAS-ESR scores was statistically significant for all patients when considered together, as well as when Etanercept and Infliximab were considered separately (p<0.0001 in all cases). However, there was no statistically significant difference in the magnitude of reduction in the mean BASDAI and ASDAS-ESR scores between patients who received Etanercept and those who received infliximab (p=0.696 and 0.618 respectively). Conclusion Etanercept and Infliximab offer statistically similar reduction in disease severity in Asian Indian AS patients with NSAID failure. Further studies with larger sample size are

This study explores immersive presence as well as emotional valence and arousal in the context of dynamic and non-dynamic music scores in the 3rd person action-adventure video game genre while also considering relevant personality traits of the player. 60 subjects answered self-report questionnai......This study explores immersive presence as well as emotional valence and arousal in the context of dynamic and non-dynamic music scores in the 3rd person action-adventure video game genre while also considering relevant personality traits of the player. 60 subjects answered self......-report questionnaires of experiential states each time after playing the game 'Batman: Arkham City' in one of three randomized conditions accounting for [1] dynamic music, [2] non-dynamic music/low arousal potential and [3] non-dynamic music/high arousal potential, aiming to manipulate emotional arousal and structural...... between the player, avatar, and game environment is assumed to moderate a continuous regulatory modulation of emotional response achieved by context effects of dynamic music....

Most of the benchmark studies on docking-scoring methods reported in the last decade conclude that no single scoring function performs well across different protein targets. In this study a comparison of thirteen commonly used force field and empirical scoring functions as implemented in DOCK, AMMOS, X-Score and FRED is carried out on five proteins with diverse binding pockets. The performance is analyzed in relation to the physicochemical properties of the binding sites. The solvation effects are considered via the Generalized Born/Surface Area (GBSA) solvation method for one of the assessed scoring functions. We examined the ability of these scoring functions to discriminate between active and inactive compounds over receptor-based focused libraries. Our results demonstrated that the employed here empirical scoring functions were more appropriate for the pocket of predominant hydrophobic nature while the force field scoring functions performed better on the mixed or polar pockets. PMID:20227800

Full Text Available Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART has been associated with dysglycaemia. However, there is scarce data on the risk of developing diabetes mellitus (DM in HIV/AIDS patients in Africa.Primarily to quantify and compare the risk of having diabetes mellitus in HIV/AIDS patients on HAART and HAART-naïve patients in Limbe, Cameroon; and secondarily to determine if there is an association between HAART and increased DM risk.A cross-sectional study was conducted at the Limbe Regional Hospital HIV treatment center between April and June 2013, involving 200 HIV/AIDS patients (100 on first-line HAART regimens for at least 12 months matched by age and gender to 100 HAART-naïve patients. The Diabetes Risk Score (DRS was calculated using a clinically validated model based on routinely recorded primary care parameters. A DRS ≥ 7% was considered as indicative of an increased risk of developing DM.The median DRS was significantly higher in patients on HAART (2.30% than in HAART-naïve patients (1.62%, p = 0.002. The prevalence of the increased DM risk (DRS ≥ 7% was significantly higher in patients on HAART, 31% (95% CI: 22.13-41.03 than in HAART-naïve patients, 17% (95% CI: 10.23-25.82, p = 0.020. HAART was significantly associated with an increased DM risk, the odds ratio of the HAART group compared to the HAART-naïve group was 2.19 (95% CI: 1.12-4.30, p = 0.020. However, no association was found after adjusting for BMI-defined overweight, hypertension, age, sex, family history of DM and smoking (Odds ratio = 1.22, 95% CI: 0.42-3.59, p = 0.708. Higher BMI and hypertension accounted for the increased risk of DM in patients on HAART. Also, more than 82% of the participants were receiving or had ever used Zidovudine based HAART regimens.HIV/AIDS patients on HAART could be at a greater risk of having DM than HAART-naïve patients as a result of the effect of HAART on risk factors of DM such as BMI and blood pressure.

Given non-negative integers $n_{i}$ and $\\alpha_{i}$ with $0 \\leq \\alpha_{i} \\leq n_i$ $(i=1,2,...,k)$, an $[\\alpha_{1},\\alpha_{2},...,\\alpha_{k}]$-$k$-partite hypertournament on $\\sum_{1}^{k}n_{i}$ vertices is a $(k+1)$-tuple $(U_{1},U_{2},...,U_{k},E)$, where $U_{i}$ are $k$ vertex sets with $|U_{i}|=n_{i}$, and $E$ is a set of $\\sum_{1}^{k}\\alpha_{i}$-tuples of vertices, called arcs, with exactly $\\alpha_{i}$ vertices from $U_{i}$, such that any $\\sum_{1}^{k}\\alpha_{i}$ subset $\\cup_{1}^{k}U_{i}^{\\prime}$ of $\\cup_{1}^{k}U_{i}$, $E$ contains exactly one of the $(\\sum_{1}^{k} \\alpha_{i})!$ $\\sum_{1}^{k}\\alpha_{i}$-tuples whose entries belong to $\\cup_{1}^{k}U_{i}^{\\prime}$. We obtain necessary and sufficient conditions for $k$ lists of non-negative integers in non-decreasing order to be the losing score lists and to be the score lists of some $k$-partite hypertournament.

Crohn's disease (CD) is a chronic progressive destructive disease. Currently available instruments measure disease activity at a specific point in time. An instrument to measure cumulative structural damage to the bowel, which may predict long-term disability, is needed. The aim of this article is...... to outline the methods to develop an instrument that can measure cumulative bowel damage. The project is being conducted by the International Program to develop New Indexes in Crohn's disease (IPNIC) group. This instrument, called the Crohn's Disease Digestive Damage Score (the Lémann score), should......: computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging enterography, and colonoscopy) will be used. A total of 24 centers from 15 countries will be involved in a cross-sectional study, which will include up to 240 patients with stratification according to disease location and duration. At least 120 additional...

Assessment of adolescents' dietary habits is challenging. Reliable instruments to monitor dietary trends are required to promote healthier behaviours in this group. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to assess adolescents' adherence to Norwegian dietary recommendations with a diet score and to report results from, and test-retest reliability of, the score. The diet score involved seven food groups and one physical activity indicator, and was applied to answers from a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) administered twice. Reproducibility of the score was assessed with Cohen's Kappa (κ statistics) at an interval of three months. The setting was eight lower-secondary schools in Hordaland County, Norway, and subjects were adolescents (n = 472) aged 14-15 years and their caregivers. Results showed that the proportion of adolescents consistently classified by the diet score was 87.6% (κ = 0.465). For food groups, proportions ranged from 74.0% to 91.6% (κ = 0.249 to κ = 0.573). Less than 40% of the participants were found to adhere to recommendations for frequencies of eating fruits, vegetables, added sugar, and fish. Highest compliance to recommendations was seen for choosing water as beverage and limit the intake of red meat. The score was associated with parental socioeconomic status. The diet score was found to be reproducible at an acceptable level. Health promoting work targeting adolescents should emphasize to increase the intake of recommended foods to approach nutritional guidelines. PMID:27483312

Scoring systems have been developed to interpret the disease severity objectively by evaluating the parameters of the disease. Body surface area, visual analogue scale, and physician global assessment are the most frequently used scoring systems for evaluating the clinical severity of the dermatological diseases. Apart from these scoring systems, many specific scoring systems for many dermatological diseases, including acne (acne vulgaris, acne scars), alopecia (androgenetic alopecia, tractio...

Patients’ reports of their experience with illness are a key health outcome, but scores that measure these reports can be difficult to interpret. Skindex-29 measures skin-related quality of life reliably and validly. In this issue, Prinsen and colleagues compare patients’ responses to “anchor” questions with their Skindex scores to derive clinically meaningful scores for the subscales of Skindex-29. The cutoff scores identify patients whose skin diseases severely affect their quality of life....

Credit scores have a profound impact on home purchasing power and mortgage pricing, yet little is known about how credit scores influence households' residential location decisions. This study estimates the effects of credit scores on residential sorting behavior using a novel mortgage industry data set combining household demographic, credit, and…

A new option that allows students to choose which of their test scores to send to colleges has generated renewed criticism of the College Board. College Board officials tout the option, called Score Choice, as a way to ease test taker anxiety. Some prominent admissions officials have publicly described Score Choice as a sales tactic that will…

Constructed response items can both measure the coherence of student ideas and serve as reflective experiences to strengthen instruction. We report on new automated scoring technologies that can reduce the cost and complexity of scoring constructed-response items. This study explored the accuracy of c-rater-ML, an automated scoring engine…

In this paper a family of scoring systems for tennis doubles for testing the hypothesis that pair A is better than pair B versus the alternative hypothesis that pair B is better than A, is established. This family or benchmark of scoring systems can be used as a benchmark against which the efficiency of any doubles scoring system can be assessed. Thus, the formula for the efficiency of any doubles scoring system is derived. As in tennis singles, one scoring system based on the play-the-loser ...

Full Text Available Abstract Background Docking algorithms are developed to predict in which orientation two proteins are likely to bind under natural conditions. The currently used methods usually consist of a sampling step followed by a scoring step. We developed a weighted geometric correlation based on optimised atom specific weighting factors and combined them with our previously published amino acid specific scoring and with a comprehensive SVM-based scoring function. Results The scoring with the atom specific weighting factors yields better results than the amino acid specific scoring. In combination with SVM-based scoring functions the percentage of complexes for which a near native structure can be predicted within the top 100 ranks increased from 14% with the geometric scoring to 54% with the combination of all scoring functions. Especially for the enzyme-inhibitor complexes the results of the ranking are excellent. For half of these complexes a near-native structure can be predicted within the first 10 proposed structures and for more than 86% of all enzyme-inhibitor complexes within the first 50 predicted structures. Conclusion We were able to develop a combination of different scoring schemes which considers a series of previously described and some new scoring criteria yielding a remarkable improvement of prediction quality.

The stratification score for a case-control study is the probability of disease modeled as a function of potential confounders. The authors show that the stratification score is a retrospective balancing score and thus plays a similar role in case-control studies as the propensity score plays in prospective studies. The authors further show how standardization using the stratification score can be used to compare the distributions of exposures that would be found among case and control partic...

Background To analyse the relationship between subjective pain score and other measures of clinical, radiographic and functional status; in particular Larsen radiographic scores and Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ); in patients with severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with a disease duration of less than 3 years. Methods In this cross sectional study of 105 patients with RA (76 women, 29 men: mean age 50.93; mean disease duration 15.86 months; 71% rheumatoid factor positive) subjective pain was assessed according to the Visual Analog Scale (VAS). Correlation coefficients between pain score and disease activity measures (patients' global assessment of disease by VAS, number of tender and swollen joints, morning stiffness, erythrocyte sedimentation rate [ESR], C-reactive protein [CRP] and titre of rheumatoid factor, radiographic evaluations (Larsen-Dale scores for radiographic damage of the small joints of the hands, wrist and feet), disability measures (health assessment questionnaire [HAQ]), and demographic variables were calculated; hierarchical regression analysis was done with subjective pain score as the dependent variable. Results The Spearman's correlation coefficient comparing subjective pain and HAQ was 0.421 (p 0.05). In regression analysis, global assessment of disease by patients explained 32.8% of the variation in pain intensity score, morning stiffness 10.7%, CRP 4.0%, HAQ 3.8% and Larsen-Dale scores explained 2.1%; other variables were not significant in the model. Conclusions Pain scores of patients with early severe rheumatoid arthritis are correlated at higher levels with patients' global assessment of disease and with morning stiffness rather than with radiographic or other clinical variables such as number of tender and swollen joints. PMID:12133169

Seven diagnostic scores for the deep venous thrombosis (DVT) of lower limbs are analyzed and compared. Two features make this exer- cise difficult: the problem of distal DVT and of their proximal extension and the status of patients, whether out- or in-patients. The most popular score is the Wells score (1997), modi- fied in 2003. It includes one subjective ele- ment based on clinical judgment. The Primary Care score 12005), less known, has similar pro- perties, but uses only objective data. The pre- sent trend is to associate clinical scores with the dosage of D-Dimers to rule out with a good sensitivity the probability of TVP. For the upper limb DVT, the Constans score (2008) is available, which can also be coupled with D-Dimers testing (Kleinjan). PMID:26502582

We present evidence, based on play-by-play data from all 6087 games from the 2006/07--2009/10 seasons of the National Basketball Association (NBA), that basketball scoring is well described by a weakly-biased continuous-time random walk. The time between successive scoring events follows an exponential distribution, with little memory between different scoring intervals. Using this random-walk picture that is augmented by features idiosyncratic to basketball, we account for a wide variety of statistical properties of scoring, such as the distribution of the score difference between opponents and the fraction of game time that one team is in the lead. By further including the heterogeneity of team strengths, we build a computational model that accounts for essentially all statistical features of game scoring data and season win/loss records of each team.

Motivation: Sequence similarity searches performed with BLAST, SSEARCH and FASTA achieve high sensitivity by using scoring matrices (e.g. BLOSUM62) that target low identity (33% identity). Adjusting the scoring matrix to reflect the identity of the homologous sequence can correct higher identity overextended alignment boundaries. In addition, the scoring matrix that produced a correct alignment could be reliably predicted based on the sequence identity seen in the original BLOSUM62 alignment....

International audience INScore is an environment for the design of interactive music scores that includes an original event-based interaction system and a scripting language for associating arbitrary messages to these events. We extended the previous version by supporting scripting languages offering a great flexibility in the description of scores and in the interactions with scores. The textual format is directly derived from the OSC message format that was defined in the original INScor...

Starting in the early 1990s credit scoring became widespread and central in credit granting decisions. Credit scores are scalar representations of default risk. They are used, in turn, to price credit, and as a result alter household borrowing and default decisions. We build on recent work on defaultable consumer credit under asymmetric information to develop a quantitative theory of credit scores. We construct and solve a rich and quantitatively-disciplined lifecycle model of consumption in ...

This paper argues that low-stakes test scores, available in surveys, may be partially determined by test-taking motivation, which is associated with personality traits but not with cognitive ability. Therefore, such test score distributions may not be informative regarding cognitive ability distributions. Moreover, correlations, found in survey data, between high test scores and economic success may be partially caused by favorable personality traits. To demonstrate these point...

Although credit history scoring offers benefits to lenders and borrowers, failure to consider situational circumstances raises important statistical issues that may affect the ability of scoring systems to accurately quantify an individual's credit risk. Evidence from a national sample of credit reporting agency records suggests that failure to consider measures of local economic circumstances and individual trigger events when developing credit history scores can diminish the potential effec...

Full Text Available Molecular docking is an important method for the research of protein-protein interaction and recognition. A protein can be considered as a network when the residues are treated as its nodes. With the contact energy between residues as link weight, a weighted residue network is constructed in this paper. Two weighted parameters (strength and weighted average nearest neighbors’ degree are introduced into this model at the same time. The stability of a protein is characterized by its strength. The global topological properties of the protein-protein complex are reflected by the weighted average nearest neighbors’ degree. Based on this weighted network model and these two parameters, a new docking scoring function is proposed in this paper. The scoring and ranking for 42 systems’ bound and unbounded docking results are performed with this new scoring function. Comparing the results obtained from this new scoring function with that from the pair potentials scoring function, we found that this new scoring function has a similar performance to the pair potentials on some items, and this new scoring function can get a better success rate. The calculation of this new scoring function is easy, and the result of its scoring and ranking is acceptable. This work can help us better understand the mechanisms of protein-protein interactions and recognition.

The all scores matrix of a grid graph is a matrix containing the optimal scores of paths from every vertex on the first row of the graph to every vertex on the last row. This matrix is commonly used to solve diverse string comparison problems. All scores matrices have the Monge property, and this was exploited by previous works that used all scores matrices for solving various problems. In this paper, we study an extension of grid graphs that contain an additional set of edges, called bridges...

A chain graph allows both directed and undirected edges, and contains the underlying mathematical properties of the two. An important method of learning graphical models is to use scoring criteria to measure how well the graph structures fit the data. In this paper, we present a scoring criterion for learning chain graphs based on the Kullback-Leibler distance. It is score equivalent, that is, equivalent chain graphs obtain the same score, so it can be used to perform model selection and model averaging.

The purpose of this study is to explore Bayesian model averaging in the propensity score context. Previous research on Bayesian propensity score analysis does not take into account model uncertainty. In this regard, an internally consistent Bayesian framework for model building and estimation must also account for model uncertainty. The…

There is a strong association between schooling attained and test scores in many settings. If this association is causal, one might expect that programs that increase school enrollment and attainment would also improve test scores. However, if there is self-selection into school based on expected gains, marginal children brought into school by such programs may be drawn disproportionately from ...

Although the design of the writing task itself may present assessment problems, the scoring of the piece of writing raises the greatest difficulties for large-scale testing of writing ability. A study investigated whether teachers and staff members of the Southwest Regional Laboratory (SWRL) (1) scored the same way, (2) agreed with each other in…

This study investigates the comparability of IQ scores. Three cohorts (1933/36, 1997/98, 2006) of Estonian students (N = 2173) are compared using the Estonian National Intelligence Test. After 72 years the secular rise of the IQ test scores is.79 SD. The mean .16 SD increase in the last 8 years sugg

Full Text Available This compendium brings together traditional as well as contemporary scoring and grading systems used for the screening and diagnosis of various thyroid diseases, dysfunctions, and complications. The article discusses scores used to help diagnose hypo-and hyperthyroidism, to grade and manage goiter and ophthalmopathy, and to assess the risk of thyroid malignancy.

This study investigated convergent validity evidence for student growth scores with high school course grades. The Measures of Academic Progress and Educational Planning and Assessment System growth scores for approximately 1,800 ninth-grade students over 2 years were related to language, arts, and mathematics course grades for developmental,…

We give a new and short proof of a theorem on k-hypertournament losing scores due to Zhou et al. [G. Zhou, T. Yao, K. Zhang, On score sequences of k-tournaments, European J. Comb., 21, 8 (2000) 993-1000.

... audit firm that will perform the audit of the PHA and may serve as the audit committee for the audit in... indicators. (b) Adjustments to the PHAS score. (1) Adjustments to the score may be made after a PHA's audit... changed by HUD in accordance with data included in the independent audit report, or obtained through...

A two-part experiment is presented that validates a new measurement tool for scoring oral reading ability. Data collected by the U.S. government in a large-scale literacy assessment of adults were analyzed by a system called VersaReader that uses automatic speech recognition and speech processing technologies to score oral reading fluency. In the…

Current multi-detector CT and electron beam tomography (EBT) technology enables the evaluation of coronary calcification. Multiple software packages are available to quantify calcification using several scoring algorithms implementing user-definable scoring parameters. We investigated the effect of

Full Text Available In this paper a family of scoring systems for tennis doubles for testing the hypothesis that pair A is better than pair B versus the alternative hypothesis that pair B is better than A, is established. This family or benchmark of scoring systems can be used as a benchmark against which the efficiency of any doubles scoring system can be assessed. Thus, the formula for the efficiency of any doubles scoring system is derived. As in tennis singles, one scoring system based on the play-the-loser structure is shown to be more efficient than the benchmark systems. An expression for the relative efficiency of two doubles scoring systems is derived. Thus, the relative efficiency of the various scoring systems presently used in doubles can be assessed. The methods of this paper can be extended to a match between two teams of 2, 4, 8, …doubles pairs, so that it is possible to establish a measure for the relative efficiency of the various systems used for tennis contests between teams of players.

This thesis considers film scoring by taking a closer look at the theoretical discourse throughout the last decades, examining current production practice of film music and showcasing a musical analysis of the film Inception (2010).

The average score of economics majors on the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) exceeds those of nearly all humanities and arts, social sciences, and business undergraduate majors but not those of most science, engineering, and mathematics majors. (Contains 1 table.)

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — 2000-2010 Annual State-Scale Service and Domain scores used to support the approach for forecasting EPA's Human Well-Being Index. A modeling approach was developed...

Studies have shown that fat lesions follow resolution of inflammation in the spine of patients with axial spondyloarthritis (SpA). Fat lesions at vertebral corners have also been shown to predict development of new syndesmophytes. Therefore, scoring of fat lesions in the spine may constitute both...... an important measure of treatment efficacy as well as a surrogate marker for new bone formation. The aim of this study was to develop and validate a new scoring method for fat lesions in the spine, the Fat SpA Spine Score (FASSS), which in contrast to the existing scoring method addresses the...... localization and phenotypic diversity of fat lesions in patients with axial SpA....

Poor pain management practices are generally discussed in terms of barriers associated with the patient, clinician and/or health care organization. The impact of deficiencies in the tools that are used to measure pain are seldom addressed. Three factors are discussed that complicate the measurement of pain: the nature of pain, the lack of meaning associated with scores generated by pain scales, and treatment goals that lack specificity and are not linked to patients' pain scores. The m...

Background Although there are multiple methods of risk stratification for ST‐elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), this study presents a prospectively validated method for reclassification of patients based on in‐hospital events. A dynamic risk score provides an initial risk stratification and reassessment at discharge. Methods and Results The dynamic TIMI risk score for STEMI was derived in ExTRACT‐TIMI 25 and validated in TRITON‐TIMI 38. Baseline variables were from the original TIMI ris...

Restaurants in the United States are regularly inspected by health departments, but few data exist regarding the effect of restaurant inspections on food safety. We examined statewide inspection records from January 1993 through April 2000. Data were available from 167,574 restaurant inspections. From 1993 to 2000, mean scores rose steadily from 80.2 to 83.8. Mean inspection scores of individual inspectors were 69–92. None of the 12 most commonly cited violations were critical food safety haz...

This study investigates the comparability of IQ scores. Three cohorts (1933/36, 1997/98, 2006) of Estonian students (N = 2173) are compared using the Estonian National Intelligence Test. After 72 years the secular rise of the IQ test scores is 0.79 SD. The mean 0.16 SD increase in the last 8 years suggests a rapid increase of the Flynn Effect (FE)…

This dissertation introduces a new type of credit scoring model which assesses credit worthiness of applicants for a loan by forecasting their probability of default. The multilevel scorecard is an improved alternative to the conventional scoring techniques which are regularly applied in retail banking such as discriminant analysis, decision trees and logistic regression scorecards. In addition, this thesis proposes a new way of data clustering for a multilevel structure which ...

In this paper we test whether the disclosure of test scores has direct impacts on student performance, school composition and school inputs. We take advantage of the discontinuity on the disclosure rules of The National Secondary Education Examination (ENEM) run in Brazil by the Ministry of Education: In 2006 it was established that the 2005 mean score results would be disclosed for schools with ten or more students who took the exam in the previous year. We use a regression discontinuity des...

A model combining student preferences for college with university admissions decisions is estimated to provide information on the role of test scores in the determination of post-secondary educational opportunities. In contrast to implications of much of the recent criticism of tests and their use, we find that scholastic aptitude test scores are more strongly related to student application and choice of college "quality" than to college admissions decisions. In addition, although there is a ...

Although some scholars maintain that education has little effect on intelligence quotient (IQ) scores, others claim that IQ scores are indeed malleable, primarily through intervention in early childhood. The causal effect of education on IQ at later ages is often difficult to uncover because analyses based on observational data are plagued by problems of reverse causation and self-selection into further education. We exploit a reform that increased compulsory schooling from 7 to 9 y in Norway...

A linear mixed model analysis of elbow and hip score data from UK Labrador retrievers was used to estimate the heritability of elbow score (0.16-0.19) and to determine a moderate and beneficial genetic correlation with hip score (0.40). A small improvement in the genetic trend of elbow score was observed during the years 2000-2008, equivalent to avoiding only the worst 3-4% of scored dogs for breeding, but close to what may have been anticipated if the current British Veterinary Association-approved guidelines were followed. Calculations suggested that a correlated response to indirect selection on hip score may elicit a greater response than direct selection on elbow score and that the genetic trend in elbow score may be explained as a consequence of the stronger selection pressure that has been placed on hip score. Increases in the accuracy of estimated breeding values for elbow score of 4-7% for dogs with elbow data only and 7-11% for dogs with both hip and elbow score were observed from bivariate analysis of elbow and hip data. A selection index confirmed the benefits of bivariate analysis of elbow and hip score data by identifying increases in accuracy (directly related to the response to selection) of 14% from the use of optimum coefficients compared to use of hip data only. The quantified genetic correlation means that hip score effectively acts as a 'secondary indicator' of elbow score in this breed and the preponderance of hip data means that it acts as a major source of information that may be used to improve the accuracy of estimates of genetic risk for elbow dysplasia. PMID:21737324

We evaluated the usefulness of rating diffusion-weighted images (DWI) using a semiquantitative score modified from the Alberta Stroke Programme Early CT Score (ASPECTS) to predict deterioration of neurological symptoms in patients with hyperacute ischemic stroke who had undergone thrombolytic therapy with recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (rt-PA). We examined 22 patients with acute stroke (14 men, 8 women, mean age 72.5 years) treated with intravenous rt-PA. All were assessed using the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) and underwent emergent magnetic resonance (MR) imaging within 3 hours and 24 hours of stroke onset. Patients were divided into a deteriorated group (16 patients), in which NIHSS scores were increased after thrombolysis, and a non-deteriorated group (6 patients). We compared the DWI score, ASPECTS, and volume of hyperintense ischemic lesion on DWI (DWI volume) of the 2 groups and examined correlations between these scores and initial NIHSS score or DWI volume. The DWI score and ASPECTS tended to be lower in the deteriorated group than the non-deteriorated group. In addition, with a cutoff value ≤7, the DWI score could discriminate the deteriorated group from the non-deteriorated group with a sensitivity of 50% and specificity of 87.5%, whereas for ASPECTS, sensitivity was 50% and specificity, 81.2%. The DWI score, ASPECTS, and DWI volume had no correlation with NIHSS score but weak negative correlations with the DWI volume (P<0.01; Spearman's test). Comparing initial NIHSS score with each DWI score and DWI volume, the non-deteriorated group tended to have higher DWI scores and smaller DWI volumes than the deteriorated group, but there was no statistical difference between initial NIHSS and DWI scores. Though the DWI score was not statistically different, the threshold would be set to 6 points or above. Comparing initial DWI score with volume, patients with low DWI scores tended to show large variation in DWI volume and

Improve students' writing skills and boost their assessment scores while adding arts education, creativity, and fun to your writing curriculum. With this vibrant resource, improving writing skills goes hand-in-hand with improving test scores. Students learn how to use acting and visualization as prewriting activities to help them connect writing…

Objectives: To validate a simplified version of the Therapeutic Intervention Scoring System, the TISS-28, and to determine the association of TISS-28 with the time spent on scored and nonscored nursing activities. Design: Prospective, multicenter study. Setting: Twenty-two adult medical, surgical, a

Within medical applications there are two main types of information design; paper-based and digital information [1]. As technology is constantly changing, information within healthcare management and delivery is continually being transitioned from traditional paper documents to digital and online resources. Activity of Daily Living (ADL) charts are still predominantly paper based and are therefore prone to "human error" [2]. In light of this, an investigation has taken place into the design for reducing the amount of human error, between a paper based ADL, specifically the Barthel Index, and the same ADL created digitally. The digital ADL was developed as an online platform as this offers the best method of data capture for a large group of participants all together [3]. The aim of the study was to evaluate the usability of the Barthel Index ADL in paper format and then reproduce the same ADL digitally. This paper presents the findings of a study involving 26 participants who were familiar with ADL charts, and used three scenarios requiring them to complete both a paper ADL and a digital ADL. An evaluation was undertaken to ascertain if there were any 'human errors' in completing the paper ADL and also to find similarities/differences through using the digital ADL. The results from the study indicated that 22/26 participants agreed that the digital ADL was better, if not the same as a paper based ADL. Further results indicated that participants rate highly the added benefit of the digital ADL being easy to use and also that calculation of assessment scores were performed automatically. Statistically the digital BI offered a 100 % correction rate in the total calculation, in comparison to the paper based BI where it is more common for users to make mathematical calculation errors. Therefore in order to minimise handwriting and calculation errors, the digital BI proved superior than the traditional paper based method. PMID:26250757

Full Text Available Scoring systems have been developed to interpret the disease severity objectively by evaluating the parameters of the disease. Body surface area, visual analogue scale, and physician global assessment are the most frequently used scoring systems for evaluating the clinical severity of the dermatological diseases. Apart from these scoring systems, many specific scoring systems for many dermatological diseases, including acne (acne vulgaris, acne scars, alopecia (androgenetic alopecia, tractional alopecia, bullous diseases (autoimmune bullous diseases, toxic epidermal necrolysis, dermatitis (atopic dermatitis, contact dermatitis, dyshidrotic eczema, hidradenitis suppurativa, hirsutismus, connective tissue diseases (dermatomyositis, skin involvement of systemic lupus erythematosus (LE, discoid LE, scleroderma, lichen planoplaris, mastocytosis, melanocytic lesions, melasma, onychomycosis, oral lichen planus, pityriasis rosea, psoriasis (psoriasis vulgaris, psoriatic arthritis, nail psoriasis, sarcoidosis, urticaria, and vitiligo, have also been developed. Disease severity scoring methods are ever more extensively used in the field of dermatology for clinical practice to form an opinion about the prognosis by determining the disease severity; to decide on the most suitable treatment modality for the patient; to evaluate the efficacy of the applied medication; and to compare the efficiency of different treatment methods in clinical studies.

. Most (~88%) of the genomes had quality scores of 0.8 or better and can be safely used for standard comparative genomics analysis. We compared genomes across factors that may influence the score. We found that although sequencing depth coverage of over 100x did not ensure a better score, sequencing read......Background More than 80% of the microbial genomes in GenBank are of ‘draft’ quality (12,553 draft vs. 2,679 finished, as of October, 2013). We have examined all the microbial DNA sequences available for complete, draft, and Sequence Read Archive genomes in GenBank as well as three other major...... public databases, and assigned quality scores for more than 30,000 prokaryotic genome sequences. Results Scores were assigned using four categories: the completeness of the assembly, the presence of full-length rRNA genes, tRNA composition and the presence of a set of 102 conserved genes in prokaryotes...

This paper presents a new method, namely the gambling score, for scoring the performance earthquake forecasts or predictions. Unlike most other scoring procedures that require a regular scheme of forecast and treat each earthquake equally, regardless their magnitude, this new scoring method compensates the risk that the forecaster has taken. Starting with a certain number of reputation points, once a forecaster makes a prediction or forecast, he is assumed to have betted some points of his reputation. The reference model, which plays the role of the house, determines how many reputation points the forecaster can gain if he succeeds, according to a fair rule, and also takes away the reputation points betted by the forecaster if he loses. This method is also extended to the continuous case of point process models, where the reputation points betted by the forecaster become a continuous mass on the space-time-magnitude range of interest. We also calculate the upper bound of the gambling score when the true model is a renewal process, the stress release model or the ETAS model and when the reference model is the Poisson model.

Objective The aim of this study was to construct a prognostic index that predicts risk of relapse in women who have completed first-line treatment for ovarian cancer (OC). Methods A database of OC cases from 2000 to 2010 was interrogated for International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics stage, grade and histological subtype of cancer, preoperative and posttreatment CA-125 level, presence or absence of residual disease after cytoreductive surgery and on postchemotherapy computed tomography scan, and time to progression and death. The strongest predictors of relapse were included into an algorithm, the Risk of Ovarian Cancer Relapse (ROVAR) score. Results Three hundred fifty-four cases of OC were analyzed to generate the ROVAR score. Factors selected were preoperative serum CA-125, International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics stage and grade of cancer, and presence of residual disease at posttreatment computed tomography scan. In the validation data set, the ROVAR score had a sensitivity and specificity of 94% and 61%, respectively. The concordance index for the validation data set was 0.91 (95% confidence interval, 0.85-0.96). The score allows patient stratification into low (0.67) probability of relapse. Conclusions The ROVAR score stratifies patients according to their risk of relapse following first-line treatment for OC. This can broadly facilitate the appropriate tailoring of posttreatment care and support. PMID:25647256

Full Text Available Background: The TIMI Score for ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI was created and validated specifically for this clinical scenario, while the GRACE score is generic to any type of acute coronary syndrome. Objective: Between TIMI and GRACE scores, identify the one of better prognostic performance in patients with STEMI. Methods: We included 152 individuals consecutively admitted for STEMI. The TIMI and GRACE scores were tested for their discriminatory ability (C-statistics and calibration (Hosmer-Lemeshow in relation to hospital death. Results: The TIMI score showed equal distribution of patients in the ranges of low, intermediate and high risk (39 %, 27 % and 34 %, respectively, as opposed to the GRACE Score that showed predominant distribution at low risk (80 %, 13 % and 7%, respectively. Case-fatality was 11%. The C-statistics of the TIMI score was 0.87 (95%CI = 0.76 to 0.98, similar to GRACE (0.87, 95%CI = 0.75 to 0.99 - p = 0.71. The TIMI score showed satisfactory calibration represented by χ2 = 1.4 (p = 0.92, well above the calibration of the GRACE score, which showed χ2 = 14 (p = 0.08. This calibration is reflected in the expected incidence ranges for low, intermediate and high risk, according to the TIMI score (0 %, 4.9 % and 25 %, respectively, differently to GRACE (2.4%, 25% and 73%, which featured middle range incidence inappropriately. Conclusion: Although the scores show similar discriminatory capacity for hospital death, the TIMI score had better calibration than GRACE. These findings need to be validated populations of different risk profiles.

Autodock Vina is a very popular, and highly cited, open source docking program. Here we present a scoring function which we call Vinardo (Vina RaDii Optimized). Vinardo is based on Vina, and was trained through a novel approach, on state of the art datasets. We show that the traditional approach to train empirical scoring functions, using linear regression to optimize the correlation of predicted and experimental binding affinities, does not result in a function with optimal docking capabilities. On the other hand, a combination of scoring, minimization, and re-docking on carefully curated training datasets allowed us to develop a simplified scoring function with optimum docking performance. This article provides an overview of the development of the Vinardo scoring function, highlights its differences with Vina, and compares the performance of the two scoring functions in scoring, docking and virtual screening applications. Vinardo outperforms Vina in all tests performed, for all datasets analyzed. The Vinardo scoring function is available as an option within Smina, a fork of Vina, which is freely available under the GNU Public License v2.0 from http://smina.sf.net. Precompiled binaries, source code, documentation and a tutorial for using Smina to run the Vinardo scoring function are available at the same address. PMID:27171006

The clinical response in ankylosing spondylitis (AS) patients treated with biologic agents can be influenced by pharmacokinetic variability among and within these patients. Therapeutic drug monitoring is seen as a valuable tool to improve patient care. The aim of this study was to generate a panel of mAbs toward etanercept (ETN) and to determine ETN and anti-ETN concentrations in AS patients. mAbs against ETN (MA-ETN) were generated using hybridoma technology. For quantification of ETN concentrations, a mAb-based TNF-coated ELISA and a mAb/mAb-based sandwich-type ELISA were developed. For evaluation of the anti-ETN Ab response, a bridging ELISA, as well as a functional cell-based assay, were constructed. Disease activity of the AS patients was measured with the AS Disease ActivityScore (ASDAS). Active disease was defined as ASDAS ≥ 2.1. A total of 59 of 76 generated mAbs were ETN specific and were characterized further. Fifty-one mAbs revealed inhibitory properties in a cell-based assay. Analysis of serum concentrations of 21 ETN-treated AS patients with the TNF/MA-ETN68C5-HRP ELISA and the MA-ETN63C8/MA-ETN61C1-HRP ELISA revealed a good Pearson's r (+0.974) but a poor intraclass correlation coefficient (+0.528) as the result of underestimation of the values in the former ELISA. At 24 wk, ETN concentrations were similar in patients with ASDAS < 2.1 and ≥ 2.1. Anti-ETN Abs were not detected in any of the patient samples tested. In conclusion, highly sensitive mAb-based immunoassays were developed for quantification of ETN and anti-ETN concentrations. The impact of these methods needs to be evaluated further in clinical practice. PMID:26843328

Objective:To determine the accuracy of BISAPscore in finding out the frequency of severity and mortality in patients with acute pancreatitis by comparing it with Ranson score. Study Design: Crosse-sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Department of Surgery, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences, Islamabad, from April to December 2010. Methodology: A total of 80 patients who presented in emergency with acute pancreatitis were included by consecutive non probability sampling technique. Cases of acute pancreatitis were classified as mild or severe based on the organ failure criteria and/or local complications according to the Atlanta Symposium. All patients were scored according to both Ranson score and BISAP score. Results: Out of 80 patients, 35 (44 percentage) were males and 45 (56 percentage) were females. The mean age was 46.89 ± 15.75 years. Twenty five patients (31.25 percentage) were classified as severe acute pancreatitis and 3 patients (3.75 percentage) had evidence of pancreatic necrosis on CT scan. The duration of hospital stay was 1 - 54 days with a mean of 13.12 ± 12.83 days and mortality rate was 5 percentage. The number of patients with a BISAP score of =3 was 15 and Ranson score =3 was 25. The observed incidence of severe disease stratified by the BISAP score has (p greater than 0.001) and by Ranson score has (p greater than 0.001). In regards to mortality, patients having BISAP score =3 has p=0.003, while patients having Ranson score =3 has p=0.002, both are statistically significant. Conclusion:The newly proposed BISAPscore is a simple and accurate tool for severity stratification and is equally effective in finding out frequency of severity and in turns mortality in patients with acute pancreatitis as Ranson score. (author)

This study examined the relationship between students' scores on Research Methods and statistics, and undergraduate project at the final year. The purpose was to find out whether students matched knowledge of research with project-writing skill. The study adopted an expost facto correlational design. Scores on Research Methods and Statistics for…

This report is issued by Drug Strategies, a non-profit research institute that promotes more effective approaches to the nation's drug problems and supports private and public initiatives that reduce the demand for drugs through prevention, treatment, and law enforcement. Drug Strategies prepares "Keeping Score" annually to capture the dimensions…

Full Text Available Poor pain management practices are generally discussed in terms of barriers associated with the patient, clinician and/or health care organization. The impact of deficiencies in the tools that are used to measure pain are seldom addressed. Three factors are discussed that complicate the measurement of pain: the nature of pain, the lack of meaning associated with scores generated by pain scales, and treatment goals that lack specificity and are not linked to patients' pain scores. The major premise presented in the present article is that the utility of pain measurement is limited because health care professionals do not have a common understanding of the meaning of scores generated by pain measurement tools, especially within the acute care setting. To address this issue, approaches to establishing instrument validity need to be broadened to include the examination of the meaning and consequences of these measurements within a specific context. Substantive improvements in pain management are unlikely to occur until criteria are identified to link explicitly the scores generated by pain measurement tools to treatment goals.

The current study is an extension of a previous investigation dealing with teacher greetings to students. The present investigation used teacher greetings with college students and academic performance (test scores). We report data using university students and in-class test performance. Students in introductory psychology who received teachers'…

distort reports. We characterize the comparable implications of the general case of a risk averse agent when facing a popular scoring rule over continuous events, and find that these concerns do not apply with anything like the same force. For empirically plausible levels of risk aversion, one can...

U.S. commercial banks are increasingly using credit scoring models to underwrite small business credits. This paper discusses this technology, evaluates the research findings on the effects of this technology on small business credit availability, and links these findings to a number of research and public policy issues.

The State Collaborative on Reforming Education (SCORE) collaboratively supports Tennessee's work to prepare students for college and the workforce. Moving forward, it is our goal that Tennessee be the fastest-improving state in the country in preparing students for the future.

It appeared not possible to construct a valid diet quality score to quantitatively evaluate the diet of the Dutch population. In order to meet still the desire for an overall dietary evaluation tool, we suggest to develop an instrument in which dietary components are included individually and visual

The treatment of cattle pain often relies upon veterinarians. The aim of this study was to qualify the influence of veterinarians skills, attitudes, and empathy on cattle pain assesment and consequently disbudding pain management. A web-based questionnaire was sent to Finnish veterinary students in either the preclinical or clinical stage, and also to production-animal practice oriented veterinarians. The questionnaire recorded demographics, statements of opinions, pain scoring of cattle conditions and procedures. Empathy towards humans (Interpersonal Reactivity Index, IRI) and reworded IRI to measure empathy towards animals were also covered. The overall response rate was approximately 40%. The association between pain and empathy scores were analyzed by Pearsońs correlation, and the factors affecting pain scores and empathy towards animals analyzed using linear models. The need for pain medication of calves during disbudding was well recognized and the intention to treat such pain was very common. Higher mean scores for cattle pain were associated with greater empathy towards humans. On average, respondents' empathy towards animals was greater than towards humans, and was associated with respondents' empathy towards humans, family size and attachment to family pet. PMID:24685101

AIM: To implement a quick and simple test- rapid assessment faecal incontinence score(RAFIS) and show its reliability and validity.METHODS: From March 2008 through March 2010, we evaluated a total of 261 consecutive patients, including 53 patients with faecal incontinence. Demographic and comorbidity information was collected. In a single visit, patients were administered the RAFIS. The results obtained with the new score were compared with those of both Wexner score and faecal incontinence quality of life scale(FIQL) questionnaire. The patient withoutinfluence of the surgeon completed the test. The role of surgeon was explaining the meaning of each section and how he had to fill. Reliability of the RAFIS score was measured using intra-observer agreement and Cronbach’s alpha(internal consistency) coefficient. Multivariate analysis of the main components within the different scores was performed in order to determine whether all the scores measured the same factor and to conclude whether the information could be encompassed in a single factor. A sample size of 50 patients with faecal incontinence was estimated to be enough to detect a correlation of 0.55 or better at 5% level of significance with 80% power.RESULTS: We analysed the results obtained by 53 consecutive patients with faecal incontinence(median age 61.55 ± 12.49 years) in the three scoring systems. A total of 208 healthy volunteers(median age 58.41 ± 18.41 years) without faecal incontinence were included in the study as negative controls. Pearson’s correlation coefficient between "state" and "leaks" was excellent(r = 0.92, P < 0.005). Internal consistency in the comparison of "state" and "leaks" yielded also excellent correlation(Cronbach’s α = 0.93). Results in each score were compared using regression analysis and a correlation value of r = 0.98 was obtained with Wexner score. As regards FIQL questionnaire, the values of "r " for the different subscales of the questionnaire were: "lifestyle" r

Despite abundant biological, biomechanical, and clinical research, return to sport after anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury remains a significant challenge. Residual rotatory knee laxity has been identified as one of the factors responsible for poor functional outcome. To improve and standardize the assessment of knee instability, a variety of instability scoring systems is available. Recently, devices to objectively quantify static and dynamic clinical exams have been developed to complement traditional subjective grading systems. These devices enable an improved evaluation of knee instability and possible associated injuries. This additional information may promote the development of new treatment algorithms and allow for individualized treatment. In this review, the different subjective laxity scores as well as complementary objective measuring systems are discussed, along with an introduction of injury to an individualized treatment algorithm. PMID:26980119

The Tunka-HiSCORE detector is a non-imaging wide-angle EAS cherenkov array designed as an alternative technology for gamma-ray physics above 10 TeV and to study spectrum and composition of cosmic rays above 100 TeV. An engineering array with nine stations (HiS-9) has been deployed in October 2013 on the site of the Tunka experiment in Russia. In November 2014, 20 more HiSCORE stations have been installed, covering a total array area of 0.24 square-km. We describe the detector setup, the role of precision time measurement, and give results from the innovative WhiteRabbit time synchronization technology. Results of air shower reconstruction are presented and compared with MC simulations, for both the HiS-9 and the HiS-29 detector arrays.

ABSTRACT: This thesis provides an explanatory introduction to the regression models of data mining and contains basic definitions of key terms in the linear, multiple and logistic regression models. Meanwhile, the aim of this study is to illustrate fitting models for the credit scoring problem using simple linear, multiple linear and logistic regression models and also to analyze the found model functions by statistical tools. Keywords: Data mining, linear regression, logistic regression....

Problem statement: Stereotype threat has repeatedly been shown to depress womens
scores on difficult math tests. An attempt to replicate these findings in China found no support for the
stereotype threat hypothesis. Our math test was characterized as being personally important for the
student participants, an atypical condition in most stereotype threat laboratory research. Approach: To
evaluate the effects of this personal demand, we conducted three experiments. Results: ...

Covariate balance is crucial for an unconfounded descriptive or causal comparison. However, lack of balance is common in observational studies. This article considers weighting strategies for balancing covariates. We define a general class of weights-the balancing weights-that balance the weighted distributions of the covariates between treatment groups. These weights incorporate the propensity score to weight each group to an analyst-selected target population. This class unifies existing we...

Most studies fail to find an impact of school inputs on outcomes such as test scores. We argue that this might be a consequence of ignoring the possibility that households respond optimally to changes in school inputs and thus obscure the real effect of such provision on cognitive achievement. To incorporate the forward-looking behavior of households, we present a household optimization model relating household resources and cognitive achievement to school inputs. In this framework if househo...

Background and Purpose: Modified Rankin score (mRS) is traditionally graded using a face-to-face or telephone interview. Certain stroke assessment scales can be derived from a review of a patient’s case-record alone. We hypothesized that mRS could be successfully derived from the narrative within patient case-records. Methods: Sequential patients attending our cerebrovascular outpatient clinic were included. Two independent, blinded clinicians, trained in mRS, assessed case-records to der...

In this paper I consider choice correspondences defined on an extended domain: the decisions are assumed to be taken not by individuals, but by committees and, in addition to the budget sets, committee composition is observable and variable. For the case of varying committees choosing over a fixed set of two alternatives I provide a full characterization of committee choice structures that may be rationalized with sincere scoring. For the general case of multiple alternatives a necessary impl...

Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) provide loans to low income individuals. The credit scoring systems of MFIs, if they exist, are strictly financial. Although many MFIs consider the social impact of their loans, they do not incorporate formal systems to estimate this social impact. This paper proposes that their creditworthiness evaluations should be coherent with their social mission and should, accordingly, estimate the social impact of microcredit. Thus, a decision support system to facilit...

PURPOSE: To test whether corneal hysteresis (CH) and corneal resistance factor (CRF) can discriminate between keratoconus and normal eyes and to evaluate whether the averages of two consecutive measurements perform differently from the one with the best waveform score (WS) for diagnosing keratoconus. METHODS: ORA measurements for one eye per individual were selected randomly from 53 normal patients and from 27 patients with keratoconus. Two groups were considered the average (CH-Avg, CRF-Avg)...

Accurate face registration is of vital importance to the performance of a face recognition algorithm. We propose a face registration method which searches for the optimal alignment by maximizing the score of a face recognition algorithm. In this paper we investigate the practical usability of our face registration method. Experiments show that our registration method achieves better results in face verification than the landmark based registration method. We even obtain face verification resu...

The popular Biometric used to authenticate a person is Fingerprint which is unique and permanent throughout a person’s life. A minutia matching is widely used for fingerprint recognition and can be classified as ridge ending and ridge bifurcation. In this paper we projected Fingerprint Recognition using Minutia Score Matching method (FRMSM). For Fingerprint thinning, the Block Filter is used, which scans the image at the boundary to preserves the quality of the image and extract the minutiae ...

Credit risk governs all financial transactions and it is defined as the risk of suffering a loss due to certain shifts in the credit quality of a counterpart. Credit risk literature gravitates around two main modeling approaches: the structural approach and the reduced form approach. In addition to these perspectives, credit risk assessment has been conducted through a series of techniques such as credit scoring models, which form the traditional approach. This paper examines the evolution of...

Full Text Available Orientation: The article discussed the importance of rigour in credit risk assessment.Research purpose: The purpose of this empirical paper was to examine the predictive performance of credit scoring systems in Taiwan.Motivation for the study: Corporate lending remains a major business line for financial institutions. However, in light of the recent global financial crises, it has become extremely important for financial institutions to implement rigorous means of assessing clients seeking access to credit facilities.Research design, approach and method: Using a data sample of 10 349 observations drawn between 1992 and 2010, logistic regression models were utilised to examine the predictive performance of credit scoring systems.Main findings: A test of Goodness of fit demonstrated that credit scoring models that incorporated the Taiwan Corporate Credit Risk Index (TCRI, micro- and also macroeconomic variables possessed greater predictive power. This suggests that macroeconomic variables do have explanatory power for default credit risk.Practical/managerial implications: The originality in the study was that three models were developed to predict corporate firms’ defaults based on different microeconomic and macroeconomic factors such as the TCRI, asset growth rates, stock index and gross domestic product.Contribution/value-add: The study utilises different goodness of fits and receiver operator characteristics during the examination of the robustness of the predictive power of these factors.

Background: Coronary artery calcification (CAC) is an independent and incremental risk marker. This marker has previously not been compared to the HeartScore risk model. Design: A random sample of 1825 citizens (men and women, 50 or 60 years of age) was invited for screening. Methods: Using the...... HeartScore model, the 10-year risk of fatal cardiovascular events based on gender, age, smoking, systolic blood pressure, and total cholesterol was estimated. A low risk was defined as...

We develop new tools for formal inference and informal model validation in the analysis of spatial point pattern data. The score test is generalized to a "pseudo-score" test derived from Besag's pseudo-likelihood, and to a class of diagnostics based on point process residuals. The results lend theoretical support to the established practice of using functional summary statistics, such as Ripley's $K$-function, when testing for complete spatial randomness; and they provide new tools such as th...

Because test scores are ordinal not cordinal attributes, the average test score often is a misleading way to summarize the scores of a group of individuals. Similarly, correlation coefficients may be misleading summary measures of association between test scores. Proper, readily interpretable, summary statistics are developed from a theory of…

A statistical comparison of Medical College Admission Test scores with National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) Part I scores of one school's students supported simple averaging of subtest scores rather than weighting as a predictor of NBME Part I performance. Similar results were obtained using basic science course examination scores. (MSE)

The prognosis of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) is currently estimated by using the revised International Prognostic Scoring System (IPSS-R). Several studies have shown that further refinement of prognostication for MDS can be achieved by adding flow cytometric parameters. However, widespread implementation of flow cytometry for the prognosis of MDS is hampered by complexity of the analysis. Therefore, the aim of this study was to construct a robust and practical flow cytometric score that could be implemented as a routine procedure. To achieve this, bone marrow aspirates of 109 MDS patients were analyzed by flow cytometry. A second cohort consisting of 103 MDS patients was used to validate the MDS flow cytometric score (MFS). The parameters forming the MFS were sideward light scatter and CD117 expression of myeloid progenitor cells and CD13 expression on monocytes. Three MFS risk categories were formed. Patients with MDS and intermediate MFS scores had significantly better overall survival (OS) compared with the patients with high MFS scores. The MFS further refined prognostication within the IPSS-R low-risk category, by identifying patients with worse OS in case of high MFS. In conclusion, a practical three parameter flow cytometric prognostic score was constructed enabling further refinement of prognostication of MDS. PMID:26503643

Despite growing interest in quantifying and modeling the scoring dynamics within professional sports games, relative little is known about what patterns or principles, if any, cut across different sports. Using a comprehensive data set of scoring events in nearly a dozen consecutive seasons of college and professional (American) football, professional hockey, and professional basketball, we identify several common patterns in scoring dynamics. Across these sports, scoring tempo---when scoring...

Full Text Available The use of massive open online courses (MOOCs to expand students’ access to higher education has raised questions regarding the extent to which this course model can provide and assess authentic, higher level student learning. In response to this need, MOOC platforms have begun utilizing automated essay scoring (AES systems that allow students to engage in critical writing and free-response activities. However, there is a lack of research investigating the validity of such systems in MOOCs. This research examined the effectiveness of an AES tool to score writing assignments in two MOOCs. Results indicated that some significant differences existed between Instructor grading, AES-Holistic scores, and AES-Rubric Total scores within two MOOC courses. However, use of the AES system may still be useful given instructors’ assessment needs and intent. Findings from this research have implications for instructional technology administrators, educational designers, and instructors implementing AES learning activities in MOOC courses.

Full Text Available PURPOSE: To test whether corneal hysteresis (CH and corneal resistance factor (CRF can discriminate between keratoconus and normal eyes and to evaluate whether the averages of two consecutive measurements perform differently from the one with the best waveform score (WS for diagnosing keratoconus. METHODS: ORA measurements for one eye per individual were selected randomly from 53 normal patients and from 27 patients with keratoconus. Two groups were considered the average (CH-Avg, CRF-Avg and best waveform score (CH-WS, CRF-WS groups. The Mann-Whitney U-test was used to evaluate whether the variables had similar distributions in the Normal and Keratoconus groups. Receiver operating characteristics (ROC curves were calculated for each parameter to assess the efficacy for diagnosing keratoconus and the same obtained for each variable were compared pairwise using the Hanley-McNeil test. RESULTS: The CH-Avg, CRF-Avg, CH-WS and CRF-WS differed significantly between the normal and keratoconus groups (p<0.001. The areas under the ROC curve (AUROC for CH-Avg, CRF-Avg, CH-WS, and CRF-WS were 0.824, 0.873, 0.891, and 0.931, respectively. CH-WS and CRF-WS had significantly better AUROCs than CH-Avg and CRF-Avg, respectively (p=0.001 and 0.002. CONCLUSION: The analysis of the biomechanical properties of the cornea through the ORA method has proved to be an important aid in the diagnosis of keratoconus, regardless of the method used. The best waveform score (WS measurements were superior to the average of consecutive ORA measurements for diagnosing keratoconus.

Fifty-one patients with mild (n = 14), moderate (n = 10) and severe traumatic brain injury (n = 27) received early rehabilitation. Level of consciousness was evaluated using the Glasgow Coma Score. Functional level was determined using the Glasgow Outcome Score, whilst mobility was evaluated using the Mobility Scale for Acute Stroke. Activities of daily living were assessed using the Barthel Index. Following Bobath neurodevelopmental therapy, the level of consciousness was significantly impro...

BACKGROUND: We explore the association between bone T-scores, used in osteoporosis diagnosis, and functional status since we hypothesized that bone health can impact elderly functional status and indirectly independence. METHODS: In a cross-sectional study (2005-2006) on community dwelling elderly (> = 75 years) from Herne, Germany we measured bone T-scores with Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry, and functional status indexed by five geriatric tests: activities of daily living, instrumental ac...

Full Text Available BACKGROUND: We explore the association between bone T-scores, used in osteoporosis diagnosis, and functional status since we hypothesized that bone health can impact elderly functional status and indirectly independence. METHODS: In a cross-sectional study (2005-2006 on community dwelling elderly (> = 75 years from Herne, Germany we measured bone T-scores with Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry, and functional status indexed by five geriatric tests: activities of daily living, instrumental activities of daily living, test of dementia, geriatric depression score and the timed-up-and-go test, and two pooled indexes: raw and standardized. Generalized linear regression was used to determine the relationship between T-scores and functional status. RESULTS: From 3243 addresses, only 632 (19% completed a clinical visit, of which only 440 (male:female, 243:197 could be included in analysis. T-scores (-0.99, 95% confidence interval [CI], -1.1-0.9 predicted activities of daily living (95.3 CI, 94.5-96.2, instrumental activities of daily living (7.3 CI, 94.5-96.2, and timed-up-and-go test (10.7 CI, 10.0-11.3 (P < = 0.05. Pooled data showed that a unit improvement in T-score improved standardized pooled functional status (15 CI, 14.7-15.3 by 0.41 and the raw (99.4 CI, 97.8-101.0 by 2.27 units. These results were limited due to pooling of different scoring directions, selection bias, and a need to follow-up with evidence testing. CONCLUSIONS: T-scores associated with lower functional status in community-dwelling elderly. Regular screening of osteoporosis as a preventive strategy might help maintain life quality with aging.

The popular Biometric used to authenticate a person is Fingerprint which is unique and permanent throughout a person's life. A minutia matching is widely used for fingerprint recognition and can be classified as ridge ending and ridge bifurcation. In this paper we projected Fingerprint Recognition using Minutia Score Matching method (FRMSM). For Fingerprint thinning, the Block Filter is used, which scans the image at the boundary to preserves the quality of the image and extract the minutiae from the thinned image. The false matching ratio is better compared to the existing algorithm.

Dietary components are important determinants of systemic inflammation, a risk factor for most chronic diseases. The Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII) was developed to assess dietary inflammatory potential. It was hypothesized that anti-inflammatory DII scores would be associated with "healthier" scores on other dietary indices. The Energy Balance Study is an observational study focusing on energy intake and expenditure in young adults; only baseline data were used for this analysis (n=430). The DII, as well as the Healthy Eating Index-2010 (HEI-2010), the Alternative Healthy Eating Index (AHEI), and the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension Index (DASH) were calculated based on one to three 24-hour dietary recalls. General linear models were used to estimate least square means of the AHEI, HEI-2010, and DASH according to DII quartiles. Those with higher (ie, more proinflammatory) DII scores were more likely to be males, have less than a completed college education, and be younger. In addition, those with higher scores for cognitive restraint for eating or drive for thinness had lower (ie, anti-inflammatory) DII scores. Linear regression analyses indicated that as the DII increased, the AHEI, HEI-2010, and DASH dietary indices decreased (ie, became more unhealthy, all Pfactor for chronic disease. PMID:26923507

Full Text Available Problem statement: Stereotype threat has repeatedly been shown to depress womens
scores on difficult math tests. An attempt to replicate these findings in China found no support for the
stereotype threat hypothesis. Our math test was characterized as being personally important for the
student participants, an atypical condition in most stereotype threat laboratory research. Approach: To
evaluate the effects of this personal demand, we conducted three experiments. Results: Experiment 1,
where in Chinese students were tested with the added independent variable of test importance. Our
results produced only marginally significant stereotype threat effects. Experiment 2, a replication of
experiment 1, yielded completely different results, with no threat effects at all. Math-test scores were
significantly higher in the threat condition for both men and women, consistent with the phenomena of
stereotype lift and stereotype reactance. Experiment 3, which did not include the test-important
variable, yielded no significant effects. Conclusion: Stereotype threat, in the mathematics domain,
does not seem to be a problem for women in China. We discuss our results in terms of factors which
moderate stereotype threat and societal differences in the U.S. and China.

What is the perfect way to take a free kick? Which players are under more stress: attackers, midfielders or defenders? How do we know when a ball has crossed the goal-line? And how can teams win a penalty shoot out? From international team formations to the psychology of the pitch and the changing room... The World Cup might be a time to forget about physics for a while, but not for Ken Bray, a theoretical physicist and visiting Fellow of the Sport and Exercise Science Group at the University of Bath who specializes in the science of football. Dr Bray will visit CERN to talk exclusively about his book: How to Score. As a well-seasoned speaker and advisor to professional football teams, this presentation promises to be a fascinating and timely insight into the secret science that lies behind 'the beautiful game'. If you play or just watch football, don't miss this event! Ken Bray - How to Score Thursday 22 June at 3 p.m. (earlier than usual to avoid clashes with World Cup matches!) Central Library reading ...

The aim of our study was to evaluate effectiveness of ultrasound treatment applied with exercise therapy in patients with ankylosing spondylitis. Fifty-two patients, who were diagnosed according to modified New York criteria, were aged 25-60, and have spine pain, were randomly assigned to two groups. Ultrasound (US) and exercise therapy were applied to treatment group (27); placebo US treatment and exercise therapy were applied to control group (25). Patients were evaluated before treatment, at the end of treatment, and 4 weeks after the treatment. Daily and night pain, morning stiffness, patient global assessment (PGA), doctor global assessment (DGA), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Functional Index (BASFI), Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Metrology Index (BASMI), Ankylosing Spondylitis Quality of Life (ASQoL) questionnaire, Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease ActivityScore (ASDAS) erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and ASDAS C-reactive protein (CRP) were used as clinical parameters. In US group, all parameters showed significant improvements at 2 and 6 weeks, in comparison with the baseline. In placebo US group, significant improvement was obtained for all parameters (except tragus-to-wall distance and modified Schober test at 2 weeks and lumbar side flexion and modified Schober test at 6 weeks). Comparison of the groups showed significantly superior results of US group for parameters of BASMI (p exercise in patients with ankylosing spondylitis. PMID:26923690

Full Text Available Abstract Background Several instruments and clinical scoring systems have been established to evaluate patients with ligamentous knee injuries. A comparison of individual articles in the literature is challenging, not only because of heterogeneity in methodology, but also due to the variety of the scoring systems used to document clinical outcomes. There is limited information about the correlation between used scores and quality of life with no information being available on the impact of each score on the utility values. The aim of this study was to compare the most commonly used scores for evaluating patients with anterior cruciate ligament (ACL injuries, and to establish corresponding utility values. These values will be used for the interpretation and comparison of outcome results in the currently available literature for different treatment options. Methods Four hypothetical vignettes were defined, based on different levels of activities after rupture of the ACL to simulate typical situations seen in daily practice. A questionnaire, including the Health Utility Index (HUI for utility values, the IKDC subjective score, the Lysholm and the Tegner score, was created and 25 orthopedic surgeons were asked to fill the questionnaire for each hypothetical patient as proxies for all patients they had treated and who would fit in that hypothetical vignette. Results The utility value as an indicator for quality of life increased with the level of activity. Having discomforts already during normal activities of daily living was rated with a mean utility value of 0.37 ± 0.19, half of that of a situation where mild sport activity was possible without discomfort (0.78 ± 0.11. All investigated scores were able to distinguish clearly (p Conclusions Here we report the correlation between the most commonly used scores for the assessment of patients with a ruptured ACL and utility values as an indicator of quality of life. Assumptions were based on expert

In many educational tests which involve constructed responses, a traditional test score is obtained by adding together item scores obtained through holistic scoring by trained human raters. For example, this practice was used until 2008 in the case of GRE(®) General Analytical Writing and until 2009 in the case of TOEFL(®) iBT Writing. With use of natural language processing, it is possible to obtain additional information concerning item responses from computer programs such as e-rater(®). In addition, available information relevant to examinee performance may include scores on related tests. We suggest application of standard results from classical test theory to the available data to obtain best linear predictors of true traditional test scores. In performing such analysis, we require estimation of variances and covariances of measurement errors, a task which can be quite difficult in the case of tests with limited numbers of items and with multiple measurements per item. As a consequence, a new estimation method is suggested based on samples of examinees who have taken an assessment more than once. Such samples are typically not random samples of the general population of examinees, so that we apply statistical adjustment methods to obtain the needed estimated variances and covariances of measurement errors. To examine practical implications of the suggested methods of analysis, applications are made to GRE General Analytical Writing and TOEFL iBT Writing. Results obtained indicate that substantial improvements are possible both in terms of reliability of scoring and in terms of assessment reliability. PMID:25773314

Full Text Available Liver biopsy is indispensable because liver stiffness measurement alone cannot provide information on intrahepatic inflammation. However, the presence of fibrosis highly correlates with inflammation. We constructed a noninvasive model to determine significant inflammation in chronic hepatitis B patients by using liver stiffness measurement and serum markers.The training set included chronic hepatitis B patients (n = 327, and the validation set included 106 patients; liver biopsies were performed, liver histology was scored, and serum markers were investigated. All patients underwent liver stiffness measurement.An inflammation activityscoring system for significant inflammation was constructed. In the training set, the area under the curve, sensitivity, and specificity of the fibrosis-based activityscore were 0.964, 91.9%, and 90.8% in the HBeAg(+ patients and 0.978, 85.0%, and 94.0% in the HBeAg(- patients, respectively. In the validation set, the area under the curve, sensitivity, and specificity of the fibrosis-based activityscore were 0.971, 90.5%, and 92.5% in the HBeAg(+ patients and 0.977, 95.2%, and 95.8% in the HBeAg(- patients. The liver stiffness measurement-based activityscore was comparable to that of the fibrosis-based activityscore in both HBeAg(+ and HBeAg(- patients for recognizing significant inflammation (G ≥3.Significant inflammation can be accurately predicted by this novel method. The liver stiffness measurement-based scoring system can be used without the aid of computers and provides a noninvasive alternative for the prediction of chronic hepatitis B-related significant inflammation.

Objectives Liver biopsy is indispensable because liver stiffness measurement alone cannot provide information on intrahepatic inflammation. However, the presence of fibrosis highly correlates with inflammation. We constructed a noninvasive model to determine significant inflammation in chronic hepatitis B patients by using liver stiffness measurement and serum markers. Methods The training set included chronic hepatitis B patients (n = 327), and the validation set included 106 patients; liver biopsies were performed, liver histology was scored, and serum markers were investigated. All patients underwent liver stiffness measurement. Results An inflammation activityscoring system for significant inflammation was constructed. In the training set, the area under the curve, sensitivity, and specificity of the fibrosis-based activityscore were 0.964, 91.9%, and 90.8% in the HBeAg(+) patients and 0.978, 85.0%, and 94.0% in the HBeAg(−) patients, respectively. In the validation set, the area under the curve, sensitivity, and specificity of the fibrosis-based activityscore were 0.971, 90.5%, and 92.5% in the HBeAg(+) patients and 0.977, 95.2%, and 95.8% in the HBeAg(−) patients. The liver stiffness measurement-based activityscore was comparable to that of the fibrosis-based activityscore in both HBeAg(+) and HBeAg(−) patients for recognizing significant inflammation (G ≥3). Conclusions Significant inflammation can be accurately predicted by this novel method. The liver stiffness measurement-based scoring system can be used without the aid of computers and provides a noninvasive alternative for the prediction of chronic hepatitis B-related significant inflammation. PMID:25360742

), and speech discrimination scores (SDSs) in quiet or in noise are common assessments made prior to hearing aid (HA) fittings. It is not known whether SRT and SDS in quiet relate to HA outcome measured with the International Outcome Inventory for Hearing Aids (IOI-HA). PURPOSE: The aim of the present...... users. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: The psychometric properties were evaluated and compared to previous studies using the IOI-HA. The associations and differences between the outcome scores and a number of descriptive variables (age, gender, fitted monaurally/binaurally with HA, first...

The use of simple linear mathematical models to estimate chemical properties is not a new idea. Albert Einstein used very simple 'gravity-like' forces to explain the capillarity of different liquids in 1900-1901. Today such models are used in more complicated situations, and a great many have been developed to analyse interactions between proteins and their ligands. This is not surprising, since proteins are too complicated to model accurately without lengthy numerical analysis, and simple models often do at least as good a job in predicting binding constants as much more computationally expensive methods. One hundred years after Einstein's 'miraculous year' in which he transformed physics, it is instructive to recall some of his even earlier work. As approximations, 'scoring functions' are excellent, but it is dangerous to read too much into them. A few cautionary tales are presented for the beginner to the field of ligand affinity prediction by linear models. PMID:16231202

Full Text Available The purpose of this study is to investigate the contribution of psychological variables and scales suggested by Economic Psychology in predicting individuals’ default. Therefore, a sample of 555 individuals completed a self-completion questionnaire, which was composed of psychological variables and scales. By adopting the methodology of the logistic regression, the following psychological and behavioral characteristics were found associated with the group of individuals in default: a negative dimensions related to money (suffering, inequality and conflict; b high scores on the self-efficacy scale, probably indicating a greater degree of optimism and over-confidence; c buyers classified as compulsive; d individuals who consider it necessary to give gifts to children and friends on special dates, even though many people consider this a luxury; e problems of self-control identified by individuals who drink an average of more than four glasses of alcoholic beverage a day.

Purpose: We evaluated the reproducibility of three visual scoring methods of emphysema and compared these methods with pulmonary function tests (VC, DLCO, FEV1 and FEV%) among farmer's lung patients and farmers. Material and Methods: Three radiologists examined high-resolution CT images of farmer's lung patients and their matched controls (n=70) for chronic interstitial lung diseases. Intraobserver reproducibility and interobserver variability were assessed for three methods: severity, Sanders' (extent) and Sakai. Pulmonary function tests as spirometry and diffusing capacity were measured. Results: Intraobserver -values for all three methods were good (0.51-0.74). Interobserver varied from 0.35 to 0.72. The Sanders' and the severity methods correlated strongly with pulmonary function tests, especially DLCO and FEV1. Conclusion: The Sanders' method proved to be reliable in evaluating emphysema, in terms of good consistency of interpretation and good correlation with pulmonary function tests

In this paper we examine the possibility of using the standard Kruskal-Wallis (KW) rank test in order to evaluate whether the distribution of efficiency scores resulting from Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is independent of the input (or output) mix of the observations. Since the DEA frontier is...... estimated, many standard assumptions for evaluating the KW test statistic are violated. Therefore, we propose to explore its statistical properties by the use of simulation studies. The simulations are performed conditional on the observed input mixes. The method, unlike existing approaches in the...... assumption of mix independence is rejected the implication is that it, for example, is impossible to determine whether machine intensive project are more or less efficient than labor intensive projects....

Purpose: We evaluated the reproducibility of three visual scoring methods of emphysema and compared these methods with pulmonary function tests (VC, DLCO, FEV1 and FEV%) among farmer's lung patients and farmers. Material and Methods: Three radiologists examined high-resolution CT images of farmer's lung patients and their matched controls (n=70) for chronic interstitial lung diseases. Intraobserver reproducibility and interobserver variability were assessed for three methods: severity, Sanders' (extent) and Sakai. Pulmonary function tests as spirometry and diffusing capacity were measured. Results: Intraobserver -values for all three methods were good (0.51-0.74). Interobserver varied from 0.35 to 0.72. The Sanders' and the severity methods correlated strongly with pulmonary function tests, especially DLCO and FEV1. Conclusion: The Sanders' method proved to be reliable in evaluating emphysema, in terms of good consistency of interpretation and good correlation with pulmonary function tests.

Background. The aim of this study was to evaluate coronary artery calcium scoring and the assessment of the risk factors in patients with myocardial infarction (MI). Methods. During the period of three years, 27 patients with MI were analyzed. The average age of patients was 66.1 years (46 to 81). Coronary arteries calcium was evaluated by multi row detector computed tomography (MTDC) Somatom Volume Zoom Siemens, and, retrospectively by ECG gating data acquisition. Semi automated calcium quantification to calculate Agatston calcium score (CS) was performed with 4 x 2.5 mm collimation, using 130 ml of contrast medium, injected with an automatic injector, with the flow rate of 4 ml/sec. The delay time was determined empirically. At the same time several risk factors were evaluated. Results. Out of 27 patients with MI, 3 (11.1%) patients had low CS (10- 100), 5 (18.5%) moderate CS (101- 499), and 19 (70.4%) patients high CS (>500). Of risk factors, smoking was confirmed in 17 (63.0%), high blood pressure (HTA) in 10 (57.0%), diabetes mellitus in 7 (25.9%), positive family history in 5 (18.5%), pathological lipids in 5 (18.5%), alcohol abuse in 4 (1.8%) patients. Six (22.2%) patients had symptoms of angina pectoris. Conclusions. The research showed high correlation of MI and high CS (>500). Smoking, HTA, diabetes mellitus, positive family history and hypercholesterolemia are significant risk factors. Symptoms are relatively poor in large number of patients. (author)

The treatment of keloids remains complex and challenging. A multitude of different treatment options exists. While current guidelines frequently promote the combination of intralesional triamcinolone acetonide (TAC) and cryotherapy as a first-line therapy for keloids, its efficacy has mainly been proven clinically and objective evaluation is widely missing. Here, we aimed to evaluate the efficacy of TAC and cryotherapy for the improvement of keloids by employing two well-recognized questionnaires for the evaluation of scar appearance and patient's quality of life. Twenty keloid patients from our outpatient scar clinic were treated with individual doses of TAC and cryotherapy in four consecutive sessions. Retrospectively, Patient and Observer Scar Assessment Scale (POSAS) and Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI) questionnaire data from those patients were analyzed to evaluate changes over five visits (one baseline, four after treatment). Both overall patient and observer scores of the POSAS significantly decreased (41.10 ± 9.771 to 29.85 ± 11.42 [p scores significantly declined over the time period studied, indicating significant improvements in scar appearance. Objective evaluation confirmed the clinically demonstrated improvements of scar appearance and symptoms after treatments with TAC and cryotherapy which was associated with significant improvements in quality of life as indicated by DLQI measures. Standardized questionnaires help in objectifying clinical improvements; however, more detailed options for scar documentation, such as objective imaging, may be additionally required for an in-depth analysis of treatment progress. PMID:27248027

Elevated Glasgow Prognostic Score (GPS) has been related to poor prognosis in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) undergoing surgical resection or receiving sorafenib. The aim of this study was to investigate the prognostic value of GPS in patients with various stages of the disease and with different liver functional status. One hundred and fifty patients with newly diagnosed HCC were prospectively evaluated. Patients were divided according to their GPS scores. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to identify clinicopathological variables associated with overall survival; the identified variables were then compared with those of other validated staging systems. Elevated GPS were associated with increased asparate aminotransferase (P<0.0001), total bilirubin (P<0.0001), decreased albumin (P<0.0001), α-fetoprotein (P=0.008), larger tumor diameter (P=0.003), tumor number (P=0.041), vascular invasion (P=0.0002), extra hepatic metastasis (P=0.02), higher Child-Pugh scores (P<0.0001), and higher Cancer Liver Italian Program scores (P<0.0001). On multivariate analysis, the elevated GPS was independently associated with worse overall survival. Our results demonstrate that the GPS can serve as an independent marker of poor prognosis in patients with HCC in various stages of disease and different liver functional status

The Quality Control (QC) Guidelines are intended to increase the efficiency, precision, and accuracy of the scoring, analysis, and reporting process of testing. The QC Guidelines focus on large-scale testing operations where multiple forms of tests are created for use on set dates. However, they may also be used for a wide variety of other testing…

A critical step in the development and use of tests of physical fitness for employment purposes (e.g., fitness for duty) is to establish 1 or more cut points, dividing the test score range into 2 or more ordered categories reflecting, for example, fail/pass decisions. Over the last 3 decades elaborated theories and methods have evolved focusing on the process of establishing 1 or more cut-scores on a test. This elaborated process is widely referred to as "standard-setting". As such, the validity of the test score interpretation hinges on the standard-setting, which embodies the purpose and rules according to which the test results are interpreted. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of standard-setting methodology. The essential features, key definitions and concepts, and various novel methods of informing standard-setting will be described. The focus is on foundational issues with an eye toward informing best practices with new methodology. Throughout, a case is made that in terms of best practices, establishing a test standard involves, in good part, setting a cut-score and can be conceptualized as evidence/data-based policy making that is essentially tied to test validity and an evidential trail. PMID:27277569

Latent class Poisson count models are used to analyze a sample of Danish test score results from a cohort of individuals born in 1954-55, tested in 1968, and followed until 2011. The procedure takes account of unobservable effects as well as excessive zeros in the data. We show that the test scor...

AIMS: To provide one of the diagnostic categories for distal diabetic polyneuro-pathy,several symptom scoring systems are available, which are often extensive andlack in validation. We validated a new four-item Diabetic Neuropathy Symptom (DNS) scorefor diagnosing distal diabetic polyneuropathy. MET

Abstract. Since Manski's (1975) seminal work, the maximum score method for discrete choice models has been applied to various econometric problems. Kim and Pollard (1990) established the cube root asymptotics for the maximum score estimator. Since then, however, econometricians posed several open questions and conjectures in the course of generalizing the maximum score approach, such as (a) asymptotic distribution of the conditional maximum score estimator for a panel data dynamic discrete ch...

Abstract Background Prognostic scores might be useful tools both in clinical practice and clinical trials, where they can be used as stratification parameter. The available scores for patients with brain metastases have never been tested specifically in patients with primary breast cancer. It is therefore unknown which score is most appropriate for these patients. Methods Five previously published prognostic scores were evaluated in a group of 83 patients with brain metastases from breast can...

In most professional sports, the structure of the environment is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact structural heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics and producing competitive advantages. Applying a generative model of scoring dynamics to roughly 10 million team competitions drawn from an online game, we quantify the relationship between a competition's structure and its scoring dynamics. Despite wi...

This study investigated the impact of anonymizing text on predicted scores made by two kinds of automated scoring engines: one that incorporates elements of natural language processing (NLP) and one that does not. Eight data sets (N = 22,029) were used to form both training and test sets in which the scoring engines had access to both text and…

The purpose of this study was to examine how different scoring procedures affect interpretation of maze curriculum-based measurements. Fall and spring data were collected from 199 students receiving supplemental reading instruction. Maze probes were scored first by counting all correct maze choices, followed by four scoring variations designed to…

Recent work has shown that multidimensionally scoring responses from different tests can provide better ability estimates. For educational assessment data, applications of this approach have been limited to binary scores. Of the different variants, the de la Torre and Patz model is considered more general because implementing the scoring procedure…

We introduce Supersparse Linear Integer Models (SLIM) as a tool to create scoring systems for binary classification. We derive theoretical bounds on the true risk of SLIM scoring systems, and present experimental results to show that SLIM scoring systems are accurate, sparse, and interpretable classification models.

Equating methods make use of an appropriate transformation function to map the scores of one test form into the scale of another so that scores are comparable and can be used interchangeably. The equating literature shows that the ways of judging the success of an equating (i.e., the score transformation) might differ depending on the adopted…

The maximum LOD score statistic is extremely powerful for gene mapping when calculated using the correct genetic parameter value. When the mode of genetic transmission is unknown, the maximum of the LOD scores obtained using several genetic parameter values is reported. This latter statistic requires higher critical value than the maximum LOD score statistic calculated from a single genetic parameter value.

The rigors of standardized testing make for numerous opportunities for examiner error, including simple computational mistakes in scoring. Although experts recommend that test scoring be double-checked, the extent to which independent double-checking would reduce scoring errors is not known. A double-checking procedure was established at a…

Full Text Available This paper proposes the use of serious games as a tool to enhance collective intelligence of undergraduate and graduate students. The development of social skills of individuals in a group is related to the performance of the collective intelligence of the group manifested through the shared and collaborative development of intellectual tasks [1]. Guess the Score GS, is a serious game implemented by means of an online tool, created to foster the development, collaboration and engagement of students. It's has been designed with the intention of facilitating the development of individual’s social skills in a group in order to promote education of collective intelligence. This paper concludes that the design of learning activities using serious games as a support tool in education, generate awareness about of utilities of gaming in the collective learning environment and the fostering of collective intelligence education.

BACKGROUND/AIM: Reference values are needed in order to interpret the Copenhagen Hip and Groin Outcome Score (HAGOS) in male soccer players with hip and groin pain. The aim of this study was to establish reference values for HAGOS in hip and groin injury-free male soccer players. METHODS: We...... included 444 groin injury-free soccer players from 40 clubs (divisions 1-4) in Eastern Denmark, mean age (SD) 23.6 (4.4), training soccer 3.4 (1) times per week. All players were hip and groin injury-free at the time of inclusion (beginning of season, 2011). RESULTS: Of the 444 hip and groin injury...... HAGOS subscales (psoccer players, with no pain in the previous or present season (n=301), are: pain: 80.1-100, symptoms: 64.3-100, activities of daily living: 80...

Diagnostic criteria for postmenopausal osteoporosis using central dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) T-scores have been widely accepted. The validity of these criteria for other populations, including premenopausal women and young men, has not been established. The International Society for Clinical Densitometry (ISCD) recommends using DXA Z-scores, not T-scores, for diagnosis in premenopausal women and men aged 20-49 yr, though studies supporting this position have not been published. We examined diagnostic agreement between DXA-generated T-scores and Z-scores in a cohort of men and women aged 20-49 yr, using 1994 World Health Organization and 2005 ISCD DXA criteria. Four thousand two hundred and seventy-five unique subjects were available for analysis. The agreement between DXA T-scores and Z-scores was moderate (Cohen\\'s kappa: 0.53-0.75). The use of Z-scores resulted in significantly fewer (McNemar\\'s p<0.001) subjects diagnosed with "osteopenia," "low bone mass for age," or "osteoporosis." Thirty-nine percent of Hologic (Hologic, Inc., Bedford, MA) subjects and 30% of Lunar (GE Lunar, GE Madison, WI) subjects diagnosed with "osteoporosis" by T-score were reclassified as either "normal" or "osteopenia" when their Z-score was used. Substitution of DXA Z-scores for T-scores results in significant diagnostic disagreement and significantly fewer persons being diagnosed with low bone mineral density.

In probability elicitation exercises it has been usual to considerer scoring rules (SRs) to measure the performance of experts when inferring about a given unknown, Θ, for which the true value, θ*, is (or will shortly be) known to the experimenter. Mathematically, SRs quantify the discrepancy between f(θ) (the distribution reflecting the expert's uncertainty about Θ) and d(θ), a zero-one indicator function of the observation θ*. Thus, a remarkable characteristic of SRs is to contrast expert's beliefs with the observation θ*. The present work aims at extending SRs concepts and formulas for the cases where Θ is aleatory, highlighting advantages of goodness-of-fit and entropy-like measures. Conceptually, it is argued that besides of evaluating the personal performance of the expert, SRs may also play a role when comparing the elicitation processes adopted to obtain f(θ). Mathematically, it is proposed to replace d(θ) by g(θ), the distribution that model the randomness of Θ, and do also considerer goodness-of-fit and entropylike metrics, leading to SRs that measure the adherence of f(θ) to g(θ). The implications of this alternative perspective are discussed and illustrated by means of case studies based on the simulation of controlled experiments. The usefulness of the proposed approach for evaluating the performance of experts and elicitation processes is investigated.

The number of successes 'n' and the normalized measure of space-time alarm 'tau' are commonly used to characterize the strength of an earthquake prediction method and the significance of prediction results. To evaluate better the forecaster's skill, it has been recently suggested to use a new characteristic, the gambling score R, which incorporates the difficulty of guessing each target event by using different weights for different alarms. We expand the class of R-characteristics and apply these to the analysis of results of the M8 prediction algorithm. We show that the level of significance 'alfa' strongly depends (1) on the choice of weighting alarm parameters, (2) on the partitioning of the entire alarm volume into component parts, and (3) on the accuracy of the spatial rate of target events, m(dg). These tools are at the disposal of the researcher and can affect the significance estimate in either direction. All the R-statistics discussed here corroborate that the prediction of 8.0<=M<8.5 events by...

Consider a network where the nodes split into K different communities. The community labels for the nodes are unknown and it is of major interest to estimate them (i.e., community detection). Degree Corrected Block Model (DCBM) is a popular network model. How to detect communities with the DCBM is an interesting problem, where the main challenge lies in the degree heterogeneity. We propose a new approach to community detection which we call the Spectral Clustering On Ratios-of-Eigenvectors (SCORE). Compared to classical spectral methods, the main innovation is to use the entry-wise ratios between the first leading eigenvector and each of the other leading eigenvectors for clustering. The central surprise is, the effect of degree heterogeneity is largely ancillary, and can be effectively removed by taking entry-wise ratios between the leading eigenvectors. The method is successfully applied to the web blogs data and the karate club data, with error rates of 58/1222 and 1/34, respectively. These results are muc...

The purpose of this study was to estimate and examine ways to improve the reliability of change scores on the Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale, Cognitive Subtest (ADAS-Cog). The sample, provided by the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, included individuals with Alzheimer's disease (AD) (n = 153) and individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) (n = 352). All participants were administered the ADAS-Cog at baseline and 1 year, and change scores were calculated as the difference in scores over the 1-year period. Three types of change score reliabilities were estimated using multivariate generalizability. Two methods to increase change score reliability were evaluated: reweighting the subtests of the scale and adding more subtests. Reliability of ADAS-Cog change scores over 1 year was low for both the AD sample (ranging from .53 to .64) and the MCI sample (.39 to .61). Reweighting the change scores from the AD sample improved reliability (.68 to .76), but lengthening provided no useful improvement for either sample. The MCI change scores had low reliability, even with reweighting and adding additional subtests. The ADAS-Cog scores had low reliability for measuring change. Researchers using the ADAS-Cog should estimate and report reliability for their use of the change scores. The ADAS-Cog change scores are not recommended for assessment of meaningful clinical change. PMID:26708116

Despite growing interest in quantifying and modeling the scoring dynamics within professional sports games, relative little is known about what patterns or principles, if any, cut across different sports. Using a comprehensive data set of scoring events in nearly a dozen consecutive seasons of college and professional (American) football, professional hockey, and professional basketball, we identify several common patterns in scoring dynamics. Across these sports, scoring tempo---when scoring events occur---closely follows a common Poisson process, with a sport-specific rate. Similarly, scoring balance---how often a team wins an event---follows a common Bernoulli process, with a parameter that effectively varies with the size of the lead. Combining these processes within a generative model of gameplay, we find they both reproduce the observed dynamics in all four sports and accurately predict game outcomes. These results demonstrate common dynamical patterns underlying within-game scoring dynamics across prof...

Abstract The Gait Deviation Index (GDI) and Gait Profile Score (GPS) are the most used summary measures of gait in children with cerebral palsy (CP). However, the reliability and agreement of these indices have not been investigated, limiting their clinimetric quality for research and clinical...... practice. The aim of this study was to investigate the intra-rater reliability and agreement of summary measures of gait (GDI; GPS; and the Gait Variable Score (GVS) derived from the GPS). The intra-rater reliability and agreement were investigated across two repeated sessions in 18 children aged 5......–12 years diagnosed with spastic CP. No systematic bias was observed between the sessions and no heteroscedasticity was observed in Bland–Altman plots. For the GDI and GPS, excellent reliability with intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) values of 0.8–0.9 was found, while the GVS was found to have fair...

Purpose The Simplified Acute Physiology Score (SAPS) 3 was recently proposed to reflect contemporary changes in intensive care practices. SAPS 3 features customized equations for the prediction of mortality in different geographic regions. However, the usefulness of SAPS 3 and its customized equation (Australasia SAPS 3) have never been externally validated in Korea. This study was designed to validate SAPS 3 and Australasia SAPS 3 for mortality prediction in Korea. Materials and Methods A re...

Full Text Available Abstract Background Medicare hospital Value-based purchasing (VBP program that links Medicare payments to quality of care will become effective from 2013. It is unclear whether specific hospital characteristics are associated with a hospital’s VBP score, and consequently incentive payments. The objective of the study was to assess the association of hospital characteristics with (i the mean VBP score, and (ii specific percentiles of the VBP score distribution. The secondary objective was to quantify the associations of hospital characteristics with the VBP score components: clinical process of care (CPC score and patient satisfaction score. Methods Observational analysis that used data from three sources: Medicare Hospital Compare Database, American Hospital Association 2010 Annual Survey and Medicare Impact File. The final study sample included 2,491 U.S. acute care hospitals eligible for the VBP program. The association of hospital characteristics with the mean VBP score and specific VBP score percentiles were assessed by ordinary least square (OLS regression and quantile regression (QR, respectively. Results VBP score had substantial variations, with mean score of 30 and 60 in the first and fourth quartiles of the VBP score distribution. For-profit status (vs. non-profit, smaller bed size (vs. 100–199 beds, East South Central region (vs. New England region and the report of specific CPC measures (discharge instructions, timely provision of antibiotics and beta blockers, and serum glucose controls in cardiac surgery patients were positively associated with mean VBP scores (p Conclusions Although hospitals serving the poor and the elderly are more likely to score lower under the VBP program, the correlation appears small. Profit status, geographic regions, number and type of CPC measures reported explain the most variation among scores.

We studied the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of 120 knees in 86 rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients and of 14 unaffected knees in 12 control cases. We also developed a scoring system as a quantitative analysis method. We divided the MRI into 10 items, and classified the severity of the symptoms into 4 grades (score 0 to 3). The average total score increased according to the radiographic grade. Soft tissue lesions were clearly detected, even in the early stages of RA. Items such as synovial proliferation showed a high score even in the early stages, suggesting that it was the initial symptom of RA. The score also showed a correlation with the inflammatory signs. These results suggest that this scoring system is very sensitive and yields a good reflection of RA activity. We demonstrated that this system is simple and convenient for routine diagnostic use. We further demonstrated that it is useful for following the advancement of RA and for evaluating the response to treatment. (author)

Mathematical skills are of critical importance, both academically and in everyday life. Neuroimaging research has primarily focused on the relationship between mathematical skills and functional brain activity. Comparatively few studies have examined which white matter regions support mathematical abilities. The current study uses diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to test whether individual differences in white matter predict performance on the math subtest of the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT). Grades 10 and 11 PSAT scores were obtained from 30 young adults (ages 17-18) with wide-ranging math achievement levels. Tract based spatial statistics was used to examine the correlation between PSAT math scores, fractional anisotropy (FA), radial diffusivity (RD) and axial diffusivity (AD). FA in left parietal white matter was positively correlated with math PSAT scores (specifically in the left superior longitudinal fasciculus, left superior corona radiata, and left corticospinal tract) after controlling for chronological age and same grade PSAT critical reading scores. Furthermore, RD, but not AD, was correlated with PSAT math scores in these white matter microstructures. The negative correlation with RD further suggests that participants with higher PSAT math scores have greater white matter integrity in this region. Individual differences in FA and RD may reflect variability in experience dependent plasticity over the course of learning and development. These results are the first to demonstrate that individual differences in white matter are associated with mathematical abilities on a nationally administered scholastic aptitude measure. PMID:23108272

The number of successes and the space-time alarm rate are commonly used to characterize the strength of an earthquake prediction method and the significance of prediction results. It has been recently suggested to use a new characteristic to evaluate the forecaster's skill, the gambling score (GS), which incorporates the difficulty of guessing each target event by using different weights for different alarms. We expand parametrization of the GS and use the M8 prediction algorithm to illustrate difficulties of the new approach in the analysis of the prediction significance. We show that the level of significance strongly depends (1) on the choice of alarm weights, (2) on the partitioning of the entire alarm volume into component parts and (3) on the accuracy of the spatial rate measure of target events. These tools are at the disposal of the researcher and can affect the significance estimate. Formally, all reasonable GSs discussed here corroborate that the M8 method is non-trivial in the prediction of 8.0 ≤M < 8.5 events because the point estimates of the significance are in the range 0.5-5 per cent. However, the conservative estimate 3.7 per cent based on the number of successes seems preferable owing to two circumstances: (1) it is based on relative values of the spatial rate and hence is more stable and (2) the statistic of successes enables us to construct analytically an upper estimate of the significance taking into account the uncertainty of the spatial rate measure.

Full Text Available Numerous studies have demonstrated a relationship between Mediterranean Diet (MD adherence and the prevention of cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and diabetes, etc. The study aim was to validate a novel instrument to measure MD adherence based on the consumption of food servings and food groups, and apply it in a female population from southern Spain and determining influential factors.The study included 1,155 women aged 12-83 yrs, classified as adolescents, adults, and over-60-yr-olds. All completed a validated semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ. The Mediterranean Dietary Serving Score (MDSS is based on the latest update of the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid, using the recommended consumption frequency of foods and food groups; the MDSS ranges from 0 to 24. The discriminative power or correct subject classification capacity of the MDSS was analyzed with the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC curve, using the MDS as reference method. Predictive factors for higher MDSS adherence were determined with a logistic regression model, adjusting for age. According to ROC curve analysis, MDSS evidenced a significant discriminative capacity between adherents and non-adherents to the MD pattern (optimal cutoff point=13.50; sensitivity=74%; specificity=48%. The mean MDSS was 12.45 (2.69 and was significantly higher with older age (p<0.001. Logistic regression analysis showed highest MD adherence by over 60-year-olds with low BMI and no habit of eating between meals.The MDSS is an updated, easy, valid, and accurate instrument to assess MD adherence based on the consumption of foods and food groups per meal, day, and week. It may be useful in future nutritional education programs to prevent the early onset of chronic non-transmittable diseases in younger populations.

Credit scores are the most widely used instruments to assess whether or not a person is a financial risk. Credit scoring has been so successful that it has expanded beyond lending and into our everyday lives, even to inform how insurers evaluate our health. The pervasive application of credit scoring has outpaced knowledge about why credit scores are such useful indicators of individual behavior. Here we test if the same factors that lead to poor credit scores also lead to poor health. Following the Dunedin (New Zealand) Longitudinal Study cohort of 1,037 study members, we examined the association between credit scores and cardiovascular disease risk and the underlying factors that account for this association. We find that credit scores are negatively correlated with cardiovascular disease risk. Variation in household income was not sufficient to account for this association. Rather, individual differences in human capital factors—educational attainment, cognitive ability, and self-control—predicted both credit scores and cardiovascular disease risk and accounted for ∼45% of the correlation between credit scores and cardiovascular disease risk. Tracing human capital factors back to their childhood antecedents revealed that the characteristic attitudes, behaviors, and competencies children develop in their first decade of life account for a significant portion (∼22%) of the link between credit scores and cardiovascular disease risk at midlife. We discuss the implications of these findings for policy debates about data privacy, financial literacy, and early childhood interventions. PMID:25404329

The Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS; Lane, Quinlan, Schwartz, Walker, & Zeitlan, 1990) is the most commonly used measure of differentiation and complexity in the use of emotion words and is associated with important clinical outcomes. Hand scoring the LEAS is time consuming. Existing programs for scoring open-ended responses cannot mimic LEAS hand scoring. Therefore, Leaf and Barchard (2006) developed the Program for Open-Ended Scoring (POES) to score the LEAS. In this article, we report a study in which the reliability and validity of POES scoring were examined. In the study, we used three participant types (adult community members, university students, children), three LEAS versions (paper based, computer based, and the LEAS for children), and a diverse set of criterion variables. Across this variety of conditions, the four POES scoring methods had internal consistencies and validities that were comparable to hand scoring, indicating that POES scoring can be used in clinical practice and other applied settings in which hand scoring is impractical. PMID:20479190

The purpose of this feasibility study was to determine the impact of establishing a comfort function goal preoperatively on postoperative pain scores and opiate requirements in lumbar fusion patients. A comfort function goal is defined as the pain score identified by the patient describing the level of pain tolerance to participate in healing activities such as deep breathing, ambulation and participation in activities of daily living. The design was prospective, nonrandomized, intervention group (n = 30) compared with retrospective chart review as control group (n = 30). Sample included patients scheduled for routine lumbar fusion in an urban southeastern hospital. The study intervention established a comfort function goal during a routine preoperative patient education class. No significant difference in pain score or opiate requirement was found for these data. However, a fundamental clinical question arose surrounding opiate requirements and dosing management. In our hospital, the norm for postoperative pain management is to categorize pain scores as mild (1-3), moderate (4-6), and severe (7-10) pain. Physician orders commonly use this differential to order opiate dose ranges. In this sample, the mean pain score for the intervention group at home is 5.8 and the mean comfort function goal is 4.9. Based on normative categories of pain scores, if a patient's baseline of tolerable pain is 4.9, this has potential impact on clinician responses to managing pain, as 4.9-5.8 is, for this patient, perhaps a mild range of pain, not moderate. If a patient reports a pain score of 7, and their norm is 5.8, the delta is only 1.2. Does this imply that the patient is experiencing mild or severe pain? Does the nurse deliver a dose of pain medication that is in the mild or severe dose range? PMID:26293197

Full Text Available An Optical Music Recognition (OMR system especially adapted for handwritten musical scores of the XVII-th and the early XVIII-th centuries written in white mensural notation is presented. The system performs a complete sequence of analysis stages: the input is the RGB image of the score to be analyzed and, after a preprocessing that returns a black and white image with corrected rotation, the staves are processed to return a score without staff lines; then, a music symbol processing stage isolates the music symbols contained in the score and, finally, the classification process starts to obtain the transcription in a suitable electronic format so that it can be stored or played. This work will help to preserve our cultural heritage keeping the musical information of the scores in a digital format that also gives the possibility to perform and distribute the original music contained in those scores.

MANAGING MISSING SCORES ON THE ROLAND MORRIS DISABILITY QUESTIONNAIRE Peter Kenta and Henrik Hein Lauridsenb aBack Research Centre and bInstitute of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics, University of Southern Denmark Background There is no standard method to calculate Roland Morris...... Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ) sum scores when one or more questions have not been answered. However, missing data are common on the RMDQ and the current options are: calculate a sum score regardless of unanswered questions, reject all data containing unanswered questions, or to impute scores. Other...... questionnaires, such as the Oswestry Disability Index (Oswestry) convert their raw score into a standardized score out of 100. An advantage of this method is that it allows missing data to be accommodated by proportional recalculation. For example, if 17 questions had been answered ’yes’ on a RMDQ questionnaire...

Full Text Available Relative individual information is a measurement that scores the quality of DNA- and RNA-binding sites for biological machines. The development of analytical approaches to increase the power of this scoring method will improve its utility in evaluating the functions of motifs. In this study, the scoring method was applied to potential translation initiation sites in Drosophila to compute Translation Relative Individual Information (TRII scores. The weight matrix at the core of the scoring method was optimized based on high-confidence translation initiation sites identified by using a progressive partitioning approach. Comparing the distributions of TRII scores for sites of interest with those for high-confidence translation initiation sites and random sequences provides a new methodology for assessing the quality of translation initiation sites. The optimized weight matrices can also be used to describe the consensus at translation initiation sites, providing a quantitative measure of preferred and avoided nucleotides at each position.

Narrowly defined personality facet scores are commonly reported and used for making decisions in clinical and organizational settings. Although these facets are typically related, scoring is usually carried out for a single facet at a time. This method can be ineffective and time consuming when...... personality tests contain many highly correlated facets. This article investigates the possibility of increasing the precision of the NEO PI-R facet scores by scoring items with multidimensional item response theory and by efficiently administering and scoring items with multidimensional computer adaptive...... testing (MCAT). The increase in the precision of personality facet scores is obtained from exploiting the correlations between the facets. Results indicate that the NEO PI-R could be substantially shorter without attenuating precision when the MCAT methodology is used. Furthermore, the study shows...

Peer instruction (PI) involves students answering questions and peer discussion learning activities. PI can enhance student performance and engagement in classroom instruction. However, some students do not engage in the discussions. This study proposes two mechanisms, discussion partner assignment and accountability scoring mechanisms, to form…

Hip fractures are common in elderly patients, and walking impairment is a frequent complication. The Cumulated Ambulation Score (CAS) is a validated functional scale used to monitor easily three basic mobility activities in patients with hip fracture. The aim of this study was to translate, cross...

Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the correlation between the recently developed Radiographic Union Score for Tibial Fractures (RUST) scoring system and clinical outcomes in tibial fractures.Methods: The study included 41 patients with tibia shaft fractures who underwent intramedullary nailing between 2005 and 2010. Mean follow-up period was 26.32 (range: 12 to 48) months. Clinical outcomes were measured using the Karlström-Olerud physical function scale, VAS score and SF-36...

BINUS students are supposed to increase their English competence indicated by their TOEFL scores. This paper aims to observe the differences between studens TOEFL scores obtained when they entered BINUS and the scores after they joined TOEFL courses at BINUS for one year. The participants were 121 students. The data for the entrance test were taken from the BINUS data center and the final test data were taken from their final test at English class. The data were analysed using sta...

SUMMARY One hundred and ten male heroin addicts were administered ‘Eysenck Personality Questionnaire’ a self reporting measure. High scores on psychoticism, neuroticism and lie scale and low scores on extroversion in heroin addicts as compared to normal controls (n=50) were observed in this study which were comparable with those reported earlier. Further, it appears that high neuroticism scores are more consistent feature of heroin addicts than deviation on extraversion. Also an attempt to un...

We propose a generalization of the wild bootstrap of Wu (1986) and Liu (1988) based upon perturbing the scores of M-estimators. This "score bootstrap" procedure avoids recomputing the estimator in each bootstrap iteration, making it substantially less costly to compute than the conventional nonparametric bootstrap, particularly in complex nonlinear models. Despite this computational advantage, in the linear model, the score bootstrap studentized test statistic is equivalent to that of the con...

Credit scoring models are very important tools for financial institutions to make credit granting decisions. In the last few decades, many quantitative methods have been used for the development of credit scoring models with focus on maximizing classification accuracy. This paper proposes the credit scoring models with the area under receiver operating characteristics curve (AUC) maximization based on the new emerged support vector machines (SVM) techniques. Three main SVM models with differe...

Using a complete set of the SEC filing information on hedge funds (Form ADV) and the TASS data, we develop a quantitative model called the ?-Score to measure hedge fund operational risk. The ?-Score is related to conflict of interest issues, concentrated ownership, and reduced leverage in the ADV data. With a statistical methodology, we further relate the ?-Score to readily available information such as fund performance, volatility, size, age, and fee structures. Finally, we demonstrate that ...

In the Western classical tradition, musicians play music from notated sheet music, called a score. When playing music from a score, a musician translates its visual symbols into sequences of instrument-specific physical motions. Hence, a music score's overall complexity represents a sum of the cognitive and mechanical acuity required for its performance. For a given instrument, different notes, intervals, articulations, dynamics, key signatures, and tempo represent dissimilar levels of diffic...

The only study guide to offer expert, customized study plans for every student's needs You've had a year to study...but also a year to forget. As the AP test approaches, other guides reexamine the entire year of material. But only one guide identifies your strengths and weaknesses, then points you directly to the review you need most My Max Score, a new concept developed by AP teachers and exam graders, offers separate review materials for long-term prep and last-minute cram sessions-no matter when you start studying, This is just what you need-plus str

Full Text Available Abstract Background Prognostic scores might be useful tools both in clinical practice and clinical trials, where they can be used as stratification parameter. The available scores for patients with brain metastases have never been tested specifically in patients with primary breast cancer. It is therefore unknown which score is most appropriate for these patients. Methods Five previously published prognostic scores were evaluated in a group of 83 patients with brain metastases from breast cancer. All patients had been treated with whole-brain radiotherapy with or without radiosurgery or surgical resection. In addition, it was tested whether the parameters that form the basis of these scores actually have a prognostic impact in this biologically distinct group of brain metastases patients. Results The scores that performed best were the recursive partitioning analysis (RPA classes and the score index for radiosurgery (SIR. However, disagreement between the parameters that form the basis of these scores and those that determine survival in the present group of patients and many reported data from the literature on brain metastases from breast cancer was found. With the four statistically significant prognostic factors identified here, a 3-tiered score can be created that performs slightly better than RPA and SIR. In addition, a 4-tiered score is also possible, which performs better than the three previous 4-tiered scores, incl. graded prognostic assessment (GPA score and basic score for brain metastases (BSBM. Conclusion A variety of prognostic models describe the survival of patients with brain metastases from breast cancer to a more or less satisfactory degree. However, the standard brain metastases scores might not fully appreciate the unique biology and time course of this disease, e.g., compared to lung cancer. It appears possible that inclusion of emerging prognostic factors will improve the results and allow for development and validation

Full Text Available The purpose of the paper is to produce a scoring model for small and medium enterprises seeking financing through a bank loan. To analyze the loan application, scoring system developed for companies is as follows: scoring quantitative factors and scoring qualitative factors. We have estimated the probability of default using logistic regression. Regression coefficients determination was made with a solver in Excel using five ratios as input data. Analyses and simulations were conducted on a sample of 113 companies, all accepted for funding. Based on financial information obtained over two years, 2007 and 2008, we could establishe and appreciate the default value.

strong correlation between the FJS and the OKS (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.81, 95% CI: 0.77-0.85;p < 0.001). The test-retest evaluation showed almost perfect reliability for the FJS total score (ICC = 0.91, 95% CI: 0.88-0.94) and substantial reliability or better for individual items of......Background and purpose - When evaluating the outcome after total knee arthroplasty (TKA), increasing emphasis has been put on patient satisfaction and ability to perform activities of daily living. To address this, the forgotten joint score (FJS) for assessment of knee awareness has been developed...... validity study and 150 in a reliability study. Correlation between the Oxford knee score (OKS) and the FJS was examined and test-retest evaluation was performed. A ceiling effect was defined as participants reaching a score within 15% of the maximum achievable score. Results - The validity study revealed a...

Studies have shown that early warning score systems can identify in-patients at high risk of catastrophic deterioration and this may possibly be used for an emergency department (ED) triage. Bispebjerg Hospital has introduced a multidisciplinary team (MT) in the ED activated by the Bispebjerg Early...... Warning Score (BEWS). The BEWS is calculated on the basis of respiratory frequency, pulse, systolic blood pressure, temperature and level of consciousness. The aim of this study is to evaluate the ability of the BEWS to identify critically ill patients in the ED and to examine the feasibility of using the...

We explored the association between Framingham risk score (FRS) and coronary artery calcium score (CACS) in asymptomatic Korean individuals. We retrospectively analyzed 2216 participants who underwent routine health screening and CACS using the 64-slice multidetector computed tomography between January 2010 and June 2014. Relationship between CACS and FRS, and factors associated with discrepancy between CACS and FRS were analyzed. CACS and FRS were positively correlated (p < 0.0001). However, in 3.7% of participants with low coronary event risk and high CACS, age, male gender, smoker, hypertension, total cholesterol, diabetes mellitus, and body mass index (BMI; ≥ 35) were associated with the discrepancy. In the diagnostic prediction model for discrepancy, the receiver operating characteristic curve including factors associated with FRS, diastolic blood pressure (≥ 75 mm Hg), diabetes mellitus, and BMI (≥ 35) showed that the area under the curve was 0.854 (95% confidence interval, 0.819–0.890), indicating good sensitivity. Diabetes mellitus or obesity (BMI ≥ 35) compensate for the weakness of FRS and may be potential indicators for application of CACS in asymptomatic Koreans with low coronary event risk.

Clinical Scenario: Injuries are inevitable in the physically active population. As a part of preventive medicine, health care professionals often seek clinical tools that can be used in real time to identify factors that may predispose individuals to these injuries. The Functional Movement Screen (FMS), a clinical tool consisting of 7 individual tasks, has been reported as useful in identifying individuals in various populations that may be susceptible to musculoskeletal injuries. If factors that may predispose physically active individuals to injury could be identified before participation, clinicians may be able to develop a training plan based on FMS scores, which could potentially decrease the likelihood of injury and overall time missed from physical activities. However, in order for a screening tool to be used clinically, it must demonstrate acceptable reliability. Focused Clinical Question: Are clinicians reliable at scoring the FMS, in real time, to assess movement patterns of physically active individuals? PMID:25054658

Full Text Available The study focused on the effect of logical choice weight and corrected scoring methods on multiple choice Agricultural science test scores the study also investigated the interaction effect of logical choice weight and corrected scoring methods in schools ,and types of school in multiple choice agricultural science test. The researcher used a combination of survey type and one short experimental design. The sample for the study consisted of 600 students selected by stratified random sampling techniques in south western Nigeria. Overall performance of students in percentage, and correlation was analyzed. The hypotheses were generated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The study revealed that there was a significant difference in the academic performance of students in logical choice weight and corrected scoring methods in multiple choice agricultural science test scores. The result also shown that there was no interaction effect on the two scoring methods in the type of schools, the location of schools in multiple choices agricultural science test. The study revealed that logical choice weight scoring method was the best method that favoured the scoring of the students’ scripts in multiple choices agricultural science test. On the basis of these findings, logical choice weight should be introduced to the teachers to use in the classroom as a new method of scoring multiple choice agricultural science the logical choice weight method is recommended in the ministry of education, in Examination Division, and to junior secondary schools for scoring JSS (3 three multiple choice test. Examination bodies such as West Africa Examination Council (WAEC, National Examination Council (NECO, Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB should adopt the use of logical choice weight method in scoring multiple choice tests. The method could be used in tertiary institutions for post ‘JAMB’ Unify Matriculation Examination (UME test. It is also

Full Text Available INTRODUCTION: Gleason score, which has a high interobserver variability, is used to classify prostate cancer. The most recent consensus valued the tertiary Gleason pattern and recommended its use in the final score of needle biopsies (modified Gleason score. This pattern is considered to be of high prognostic value in surgical specimens. This study emphasized the evaluation of the modified score agreement in needle biopsies and in surgical specimen, as well as the interobserver variability of this score MATERIALS AND METHODS: Three pathologists evaluated the slides of needle biopsies and surgical specimens of 110 patients, reporting primary, secondary and tertiary Gleason patterns and after that, traditional and modified Gleason scores were calculated. Kappa test (K assessed the interobserver agreement and the agreement between the traditional and modified scores of the biopsy and of the surgical specimen RESULTS: Interobserver agreement in the biopsy was K = 0.36 and K = 0.35, and in the surgical specimen it was K = 0.46 and K = 0.36, for the traditional and modified scores, respectively. The tertiary Gleason grade was found in 8%, 0% and 2% of the biopsies and in 8%, 0% and 13% of the surgical specimens, according to observers 1, 2 and 3, respectively. When evaluating the agreement of the traditional and modified Gleason scores in needle biopsy with both scores of the surgical specimen, a similar agreement was found through Kappa CONCLUSION: Contrary to what was expected, the modified Gleason score was not superior in the agreement between the biopsy score and the specimen, or in interobserver reproducibility, in this study.

Full Text Available OBJECTIVE: to translate the Hip Outcome Score clinical evaluation questionnaire into Portuguese and culturally adapt it for Brazil.METHODS: the Hip Outcome Score questionnaire was translated into Portuguese following the methodology consisting of the steps of translation, back-translation, pretesting and final translation.RESULTS: the pretesting was applied to 30 patients with hip pain without arthrosis. In the domain relating to activities of daily living, there were no difficulties in comprehending the translated questionnaire. In presenting the final translation of the questionnaire, all the questions were understood by more than 85% of the individuals.CONCLUSION: the Hip Outcome Score questionnaire was translated and adapted to the Portuguese language and can be used in clinical evaluation on the hip. Additional studies are underway with the objective of evaluating the reproducibility and validity of the Brazilian translation.

Aim: To create the first national centile charts for the chest radiograph Northern Score using the UK Cystic Fibrosis (CF) Database (UKCFD). Materials and methods: All active patients for 2002 from the UKCFD were analysed in 1-year cohorts from 0 to 18 years. Northern Score results from the annual review forms were used to construct centile lines for the 5th, 25th, 50th, 75th, 95th centiles. Results: There were 1806 patients with recorded Northern Score data for 2002 (927 male patients, male:female ratio 1.05). The centile chart demonstrates a quasi-linear rise throughout childhood. A Northern Score in excess of age in years equates to >95th centile in school-aged CF patients. Conclusion: This centile chart provides a disease-specific reference range for monitoring individual patients or for evaluating therapeutic change using the dominant chest radiograph scoring system in the UK. Patients, parents and clinicians may find these useful during the annual review process

Objectives: We quantified medical signs and symptoms to construct the Physical Symptom Score (PSS) for use in research to assess somatic disease burden in mucopolysaccharidoses (MPS) to track disease and monitor treatments. We examined scoring reliability, its concurrent validity with other measures, and relationship to age in MPS type I.

This dissertation contains three independently conducted studies on factors that affect the math achievement scores of preschool-aged children. The first study examined the associations between children's executive-functioning (EF) and math achievement scores at 54 months of age. Results suggest that EF is strongly associated with children's…

A tape recording system for recording night cough in asthmatics at home is described. Objective cough counts and half hour periods containing cough did not correlate with diary card scores awarded to eight children on seven nights each. Night cough diary scores may mislead in the assessment of symptom severity.

Comparison of SAT math scores, high school grade point averages (GPAs), and final chemistry grades for both the 1972 and 1976 fall semester classes of the first-year chemistry course at the University of Virginia showed that SAT math scores were a much better predictor of final chemistry grades than were high school GPAs. (BB)

Explores the comparative performance of various segments of the student sample in general chemistry courses relative to their scores on the mathematical SAT test. Results indicate that mathematical skill measured by the SAT scores is an important factor in determining grades while factors that are not important in determining grades are gender…

Multi detector computed tomography (MDCT) underestimates the coronary calcium score as compared to electron beam tomography (EBT). Therefore clinical risk stratification based on MDCT calcium scoring may be inaccurate. The aim of this study was to assess the feasibility of a new phantom which...

One strategy commonly used to simplify the joint interpretation of interest and confidence inventories is the use of cutoff scores to classify individuals dichotomously as having high or low levels of confidence and interest, respectively. The present study examined the adequacy of cutoff scores currently recommended for the joint interpretation…

This study was an investigation of the relation between the reliability of difference scores, considered as a parameter characterizing a population of examinees, and the reliability estimates obtained from random samples from the population. The parameters in familiar equations for the reliability of difference scores were redefined in such a way…

How longitudinal factor score estimation--the estimation of the evolution of factor scores for individual examinees over time--can profit from the Kalman filter technique is described. The Kalman estimates change more cautiously over time, have lower estimation error variances, and reproduce the LISREL program latent state correlations more…

Introduction: This paper undertakes to investigate the connection between two approaches to scoring translation by examining 115 test papers of the translation component of the C1 level PROFEX English for Medical Purposes (EMP) exam. The main objective of the study is to reveal whether, and to what extent, the method of assessment influences the score.

Purpose: We examined variability of speech intelligibility scores and how well intelligibility scores predicted group membership among 5-year-old children with speech motor impairment (SMI) secondary to cerebral palsy and an age-matched group of typically developing (TD) children. Method: Speech samples varying in length from 1-4 words were…

Background and purpose: It is likely that the most common method for calculating a Roland Morris Disability Index (RMDQ) sum score is to simply ignore any unanswered questions. In contrast, the raw sum score on the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) is converted to a 0-100 scale, with the advantage...

Two types of test scores were analyzed to examine whether sixty teachers were unable to use Kohlberg's measurement system for determining stages of moral thought because they were stage scoring invalidly on the basis of content. This proved to be the case. (Author/JKS)

Many Canadian provinces provide guidelines for teachers to determine students' final grades by combining a percentage of students' scores from provincial large-scale assessments with their term scores. This practice is thought to hold students accountable by motivating them to put effort into completing the large-scale assessment, thereby…

The current New Jersey high school graduation law requires that students pass a ninth grade test in reading, writing, and mathematics. Equating the writing test from year to year to be sure that passing scores remain identical, regardless of the test form administered, requires developing a scoring technique. A research study was developed based…

This checklist is based on "Evaluation Criteria for SREB-SCORE Learning Objects" and is designed to help schools and colleges determine the quality and effectiveness of learning objects. It is suggested that each learning object be rated to the extent to which it meets the criteria and the SREB-SCORE definition of a learning object. A learning…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between District Performance Scores (DPS) in Louisiana and (a) socio-economic status of students, (b) academic achievement using average ACT scores, (c) percentage of certified teachers, (d) district class size, (e) per pupil expenditure, and (f) percentage of minority students in…

Counselors with low dogmatism scores are more effective than counselors with higher dogmatism scores. Over the course of training, the group of trainees classified as highly dogmatic both decreased in level of dogmatism and increased in level of counseling effectiveness as measured by improvement in level of performance. (Author)

Credit scoring models are widely used to predict the probability of client default. To measure the quality of such scoring models it is possible to use quantitative indices such as the Gini index, Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistics (KS), Lift, the Mahalanobis distance, and information statistics. This paper reviews and illustrates the use of these indices in practice.

The relationship between student GPAs and scores on the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners tests was investigated in an effort to determine if the chiropractic curriculum was properly preparing students to be licensed. The study found that there was a significant correlation between GPAs and board scores. (Author/MLW)

Investigated the unidimensionality of the European Community Respiratory Health Survey (ECRHS) screening questionnaire and determined and validated a scoring of asthma-like symptoms seriousness. Data from 6,946 adults at 3 Italian screening centers found a single dimension underlying the screening questionnaire. A scoring of asthma-like symptoms…

Objective. To compare Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) scores with overall postoperative pain medication requirements including cumulative dose and patterns of medication utilization and to determine whether VAS scores predict pain medication utilization. Methods. VAS scores and pain medication data were collected from participants in a randomized trial of the utility of phenazopyridine for improved pain control following gynecologic surgery. Results. The mean age of the 219 participants was 54 (range19 to 94). We did not detect any association between VAS and pain medication utilization for patient-controlled anesthesia (PCA) or RN administered (intravenous or oral) medications. We also did not detect any association between the number of VAS scores recorded and mean pain scores. Conclusion. Postoperative VAS scores do not predict pain medication use in catheterized women inpatients following gynecologic surgery. Increased pain severity, as reflected by higher VAS scores, is not associated with an increase in pain assessment. Our findings suggest that VAS scores are of limited utility for optimal pain control. Alternative or complimentary methods may improve pain management. PMID:22110938

Full Text Available Objective. To compare Visual Analogue Scale (VAS scores with overall postoperative pain medication requirements including cumulative dose and patterns of medication utilization and to determine whether VAS scores predict pain medication utilization. Methods. VAS scores and pain medication data were collected from participants in a randomized trial of the utility of phenazopyridine for improved pain control following gynecologic surgery. Results. The mean age of the 219 participants was 54 (range19 to 94. We did not detect any association between VAS and pain medication utilization for patient-controlled anesthesia (PCA or RN administered (intravenous or oral medications. We also did not detect any association between the number of VAS scores recorded and mean pain scores. Conclusion. Postoperative VAS scores do not predict pain medication use in catheterized women inpatients following gynecologic surgery. Increased pain severity, as reflected by higher VAS scores, is not associated with an increase in pain assessment. Our findings suggest that VAS scores are of limited utility for optimal pain control. Alternative or complimentary methods may improve pain management.

A computer program for scoring written simulation tests provides individual scores and basic item analysis data. The program is written in Fortran IV and can accomodate up to thirty-five hundred options and up to ten thousand examinees. (Author/JKS)

Describes an expert panel member's experiences in working with Educational Testing Service to redesign the scoring for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Early Adolescence/English Language Arts Assessment. Maintains that a less mechanistic and more valid scoring system could have been developed if criticism and open discussion…

This study deals with the ordinal data in the performance analysis framework and provides a weight-restricted DEA model to obtain the preference score of each unit under assessment. The obtained scores are used to rank DMUs. Furthermore, to decrease the complexity of the provided model, the number of the constraints is decreased by some linear transformations

State-of-the-art score normalization methods use generative models that rely on sometimes unrealistic assumptions. We propose a novel parameter estimation method for score normalization based on logistic regression. Experiments on the Gov2 and CluewebA collection indicate that our method is consiste

Instructors commonly use exam reviews to help students prepare for exams and to increase student success. The current study compared the effects of traditional, trivia, and practice test-based exam reviews on actual exam scores, as well as students' attitudes toward each review. Findings suggested that students' exam scores were significantly…

Tennis scores represent a natural language domain that offers the unique opportunity to study the effects of discourse constraints on prosody with strict control over syntactic and lexical variation. This study analyzed a set of tennis scores, such as "30-15," from live recordings of several Wimbledon and Davis Cup matches. The objective was to…

In this article, we review four software packages for implementing propensity score analysis in R: "Matching, MatchIt, PSAgraphics," and "twang." After briefly discussing essential elements for propensity score analysis, we apply each package to a data set from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study in order to estimate the…

The intention of the "Bologna score" is to quantify, both in an individual labor and in a wider population, the extent to which labors have been managed as if they are normal as opposed to complicated. In this way it may be possible to assess both attitudes and practices within a maternity service toward the effective care of normal labor. A scoring system for normal labor was proposed at the World Health Organization (Regional Office for Europe) Task Force Meeting on Monitoring and Evaluation of Perinatal Care, held in Bologna in January 2000. This paper describes conceptual development of the scale. Recommendations for future evaluation of the Bologna score's validity and potential include field testing globally, comparison with the Apgar score, and evaluation of the relative weight contributed by each of the five measures comprising the Bologna score. PMID:11380378

Alignment algorithms are powerful tools for searching for homologous proteins in databases, providing a score for each sequence present in the database. It has been well known for 20 years that the shape of the score distribution looks like an extreme value distribution. The extremely large number of times biologists face this class of distributions raises the question of the evolutionary origin of this probability law. We investigated the possibility of deriving the main properties of sequence alignment score distributions from a basic evolutionary process: a duplication-divergence protein evolution process in a sequence space. Firstly, the distribution of sequences in this space was defined with respect to the genetic distance between sequences. Secondly, we derived a basic relation between the genetic distance and the alignment score. We obtained a novel score probability distribution which is qualitatively very similar to that of Karlin-Altschul but performing better than all other previous model. PMID:21258650

channel (negative). In both cases, LIFE responded negatively to features associated with historical channel modification. We suggest that there are several mechanisms for these relationships, including the narrower tolerances of taxa preferring high velocity habitat; these taxa are also continually...... recovering from extreme flow events over an inter-annual timescale. 4. At the East Midlands sites, there was an interaction between degree of resectioning and antecedent low flow. At sites with a greater extent of resectioning, the LIFE-discharge relationship was also steeper than at less modified sites...... future work aiming to define flow-habitat-biota relationships. 6. The derived models may be used to help guide environmental flow allocations, for example by predicting the slope of response of LIFE score to flow for comparable new locations which lack biological data...

Full Text Available Abstract Background Pattern discovery in DNA sequences is one of the most fundamental problems in molecular biology with important applications in finding regulatory signals and transcription factor binding sites. An important task in this problem is to search (or predict known binding sites in a new DNA sequence. For this reason, all subsequences of the given DNA sequence are scored based on an scoring function and the prediction is done by selecting the best score. By assuming no dependency between binding site base positions, most of the available tools for known binding site prediction are designed. Recently Tomovic and Oakeley investigated the statistical basis for either a claim of dependence or independence, to determine whether such a claim is generally true, and they presented a scoring function for binding site prediction based on the dependency between binding site base positions. Our primary objective is to investigate the scoring functions which can be used in known binding site prediction based on the assumption of dependency or independency in binding site base positions. Results We propose a new scoring function based on the dependency between all positions in biding site base positions. This scoring function uses joint information content and mutual information as a measure of dependency between positions in transcription factor binding site. Our method for modeling dependencies is simply an extension of position independency methods. We evaluate our new scoring function on the real data sets extracted from JASPAR and TRANSFAC data bases, and compare the obtained results with two other well known scoring functions. Conclusion The results demonstrate that the new approach improves known binding site discovery and show that the joint information content and mutual information provide a better and more general criterion to investigate the relationships between positions in the TFBS. Our scoring function is formulated by simple

In this paper we will present the results of a three year subsidized research project investigating the performance of a new scoring rule for digital assessment. The scoring rule incorporates response time and accuracy in an adaptive environment. The project aimed to assess the validity and reliabil

Children with specific reading disability (SRD) or specific language impairment (SLI), who scored poorly on an auditory discrimination task, did up to 140 runs on the failed task. Forty-one percent of the children produced widely fluctuating scores that did not improve across runs (untrainable errant performance), 23% produced widely fluctuating…

Background/Aims The AIMS65 score has not been sufficiently validated in Korea. The objective of this study was to compare the AIMS65 and other scoring systems for the prediction of various clinical outcomes in Korean patients with acute nonvariceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding (NVUGIB). Methods The AIMS65 score, clinical and full Rockall scores (cRS and fRS) and Glasgow-Blatchford (GBS) score were calculated in patients with NVUGIB in a single center retrospectively. The performance of these scores for predicting mortality, rebleeding, transfusion requirement, and endoscopic intervention was assessed by calculating the area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve. Results Of the 523 patients, 3.4% died within 30 days, 2.5% experienced rebleeding, 40.0% required endoscopic intervention, and 75.7% needed transfusion. The AIMS65 score was useful for predicting the 30-day mortality, the need for endoscopic intervention and for transfusion. The fRS was superior to the AIMS65, GBS, and cRS for predicting endoscopic intervention and the GBS was superior to the AIMS65, fRS, and cRS for predicting the transfusion requirement. Conclusions The AIMS65 score was useful for predicting the 30-day mortality, transfusion requirement, and endoscopic intervention in Korean patients with acute NVUGIB. However, it was inferior to the GBS and fRS for predicting the transfusion requirement and endoscopic intervention, respectively. PMID:27377742

Full Text Available Mariam Fida,1 Salah Eldin Kassab2 1Department of Molecular Medicine, College of Medicine and Medical Sciences, Arabian Gulf University, Manama, Bahrain; 2Department of Medical Education, Faculty of Medicine, Suez Canal University, Ismailia, Egypt Purpose: The development of clinical problem-solving skills evolves over time and requires structured training and background knowledge. Computer-based case simulations (CCS have been used for teaching and assessment of clinical reasoning skills. However, previous studies examining the psychometric properties of CCS as an assessment tool have been controversial. Furthermore, studies reporting the integration of CCS into problem-based medical curricula have been limited. Methods: This study examined the psychometric properties of using CCS software (DxR Clinician for assessment of medical students (n=130 studying in a problem-based, integrated multisystem module (Unit IX during the academic year 2011–2012. Internal consistency reliability of CCS scores was calculated using Cronbach's alpha statistics. The relationships between students' scores in CCS components (clinical reasoning, diagnostic performance, and patient management and their scores in other examination tools at the end of the unit including multiple-choice questions, short-answer questions, objective structured clinical examination (OSCE, and real patient encounters were analyzed using stepwise hierarchical linear regression. Results: Internal consistency reliability of CCS scores was high (α=0.862. Inter-item correlations between students' scores in different CCS components and their scores in CCS and other test items were statistically significant. Regression analysis indicated that OSCE scores predicted 32.7% and 35.1% of the variance in clinical reasoning and patient management scores, respectively (P<0.01. Multiple-choice question scores, however, predicted only 15.4% of the variance in diagnostic performance scores (P<0.01, while

Objectives: Lower-extremity stress fracture injuries are a major cause of morbidity in physically active populations. The ability to efficiently screen for modifiable risk factors associated with injury is critical in developing and implementing effective injury prevention programs. The purpose of this study was to determine if baseline Landing Error Scoring System (LESS) scores were associated with the incidence rate of lower-extremity stress fracture during four years of follow-up. Methods:...

Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) is an emerging treatment option for liver tumors. This study evaluated outcomes after SBRT to identify prognostic variables and to develop a novel scoring system predictive of survival. The medical records of 52 patients with a total of 85 liver lesions treated with SBRT from 2003 to 2010 were retrospectively reviewed. Twenty-four patients had 1 lesion; 27 had 2 or more. Thirteen lesions were primary tumors; 72 were metastases. Fiducials were placed in all patients prior to SBRT. The median prescribed dose was 30 Gy (range, 16 – 50 Gy) in a median of 3 fractions (range, 1–5). With median follow-up of 11.3 months, median overall survival (OS) was 12.5 months, and 1 year OS was 50.8%. In 42 patients with radiographic follow up, 1 year local control was 74.8%. On univariate analysis, number of lesions (p = 0.0243) and active extralesional disease (p < 0.0001) were predictive of OS; Karnofsky Performance Status (KPS) approached statistical significance (p = 0.0606). A scoring system for predicting survival was developed by allocating 1 point for each of the three following factors: active extralesional disease, 2 or more lesions, and KPS ≤ 80%. Score was associated with OS (p < 0.0001). For scores of 0, 1, 2 and 3, median survival intervals were 34, 12.5, 7.6, and 2.8 months, respectively. SBRT offers a safe and feasible treatment option for liver tumors. A prognostic scoring system based on the number of liver lesions, activity of extralesional disease, and KPS predicts survival following SBRT and can be used as a guide for prospective validation and ultimately for treatment decision-making

Full Text Available The majority of the world's coral reefs are in various stages of decline. While a suite of disturbances (overfishing, eutrophication, and global climate change have been identified, the mechanism(s of reef system decline remain elusive. Increased microbial and viral loading with higher percentages of opportunistic and specific microbial pathogens have been identified as potentially unifying features of coral reefs in decline. Due to their relative size and high per cell activity, a small change in microbial biomass may signal a large reallocation of available energy in an ecosystem; that is the microbialization of the coral reef. Our hypothesis was that human activities alter the energy budget of the reef system, specifically by altering the allocation of metabolic energy between microbes and macrobes. To determine if this is occurring on a regional scale, we calculated the basal metabolic rates for the fish and microbial communities at 99 sites on twenty-nine coral islands throughout the Pacific Ocean using previously established scaling relationships. From these metabolic rate predictions, we derived a new metric for assessing and comparing reef health called the microbialization score. The microbialization score represents the percentage of the combined fish and microbial predicted metabolic rate that is microbial. Our results demonstrate a strong positive correlation between reef microbialization scores and human impact. In contrast, microbialization scores did not significantly correlate with ocean net primary production, local chla concentrations, or the combined metabolic rate of the fish and microbial communities. These findings support the hypothesis that human activities are shifting energy to the microbes, at the expense of the macrobes. Regardless of oceanographic context, the microbialization score is a powerful metric for assessing the level of human impact a reef system is experiencing.

An Optical Music Recognition (OMR) system especially adapted for handwritten musical scores of the XVII-th and the early XVIII-th centuries written in white mensural notation is presented. The system performs a complete sequence of analysis stages: the input is the RGB image of the score to be analyzed and, after a preprocessing that returns a black and white image with corrected rotation, the staves are processed to return a score without staff lines; then, a music symbol processing stage i...

The goal of the present research is to investigate and analyze possible peculiarities of the psychological state of cancer patients undergoing treatment. Scores characterizing the trait and state anxiety were acquired using the Integrative Anxiety Test from four groups: adults with no appreciable disease, pregnant women, cancer patients examined during the specific antitumor treatment, and cancer patients brought into lasting clinical remission. Statistical analysis of the testing results revealed the bimodal type of the distribution of scores. The only statistically significant exception was the distribution of the state anxiety scores in cancer patients undergoing treatment that was clearly unimodal. PMID:26176239

Full Text Available The article introduces a new methodology of temporal influence measurement (seasonal oscillations, temporal patterns for behavioural scoring development purposes. The paper shows how significant temporal variables can be recognised and then integrated into the behavioural scoring models in order to improve model performance. Behavioural scoring models are integral parts of the Basel II standard on Internal Ratings-Based Approaches (IRB. The IRB approach much more precisely reflects individual risk bank profile.A solution of the problem of how to analyze and integrate macroeconomic and microeconomic factors represented in time series into behavioural scorecard models will be shown in the paper by using the REF II model.

We analyze a data set comprised of academic records of undergraduates at the University of Oregon from 2000-2004. We find correlations of roughly 0.35 to 0.5 between SAT scores and upper division, in-major GPA (henceforth, GPA). Interestingly, low SAT scores do not preclude high performance in most majors. That is, the distribution of SAT scores after conditioning on high GPA (e.g., 3.5 or even 4.0) typically extends below 1000 (the average among test takers). We hypothesize that "overachieve...

MANAGING MISSING SCORES ON THE ROLAND MORRIS DISABILITY QUESTIONNAIRE Peter Kenta and Henrik Hein Lauridsenb aBack Research Centre and bInstitute of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics, University of Southern Denmark Background There is no standard method to calculate Roland Morris Disability......, such as the Oswestry Disability Index (Oswestry) convert their raw score into a standardized score out of 100. An advantage of this method is that it allows missing data to be accommodated by proportional recalculation. For example, if 17 questions had been answered ’yes’ on a RMDQ questionnaire containing 23 yes...

Measuring surgical business performance for Army military treatment facilities is currently done through 6 business metrics developed by the Army Medical Command (MEDCOM) Surgical Services Service Line (3SL). Development of a composite score for business performance has the potential to simplify and synthesize measurement, improving focus for strategic goal setting and implementation. However, several considerations, ranging from data availability to submetric selection, must be addressed to ensure the score is accurate and representative. This article presents the methodology used in the composite score's creation and presents a metric based on return on investment and a measure of cases recaptured from private networks. PMID:27244067

Objective: To assess whether these characteristics of less misclassification and greater area under receiver opera-tor characteristic (ROC) curve of the new injury severity score (NISS) are better than the injury severity score (ISS) as applying it to our multiple trauma patients registered into the emergency intensive care unit (EICU). Methods: This was a retrospective review of registry data from 2 286 multiple trauma patients consecutively reg-istered into the EICU from January 1,1997 to December 31, 2006 in the Second Affiliated Hospital, Medical School of Zhejiang University in China. Comparisons between ISS and NISS were made using misclassification rates, ROC curve analysis, and the H-L statistics by univariate and mul-tivariate logistic progression model. Results: Among the 2 286 patients, 176 (7.7%) were excluded because of deaths on arrival or patients less than 16 years of age. The study population therefore comprised 2 110 patients. Mean EICU length of stay (LOS) was 7.8 days±2.4 days. Compared with the blunt injury group, the penetrating injury group had a higher percentage of male, lower mean EICU LOS and age. The most frequently injured body regions were extremities and head/neck, followed by thorax, face and abdomen in the blunt injury group; whereas, thorax and abdomen were more frequently seen in the pen-etrating injury group. The minimum misclassification rate for NISS was slightly less than ISS in all groups (4.01% versus 4.49%). However, NISS had more tendency to misclassify in the penetrating injury group. This, we noted, was attributed mainly to a higher false-positive rate (21.04% versus 15.55% for ISS, t=-3.310, P<0.001), resulting in an over-all misclassification rate of 23.57% for NISS versus 18.79% for ISS (t=3.290, P<0.001). In the whole sample, NISS pre-sented equivalent discrimination (area under ROC curve:NISS=0.938 versus ISS=0.943). The H-L statistics showed poorer calibration (48.64 versus 32.11, t=3.305, P<0.001) in the

The relationship between Elizur's Hostility Scoring on the Rorschach Test and the Acting-Out Score on the Hand Test was examined. Correlations between the two measures (using several scoring procedures) ranged from .40 to .64. (JKS)

Full Text Available Monitoring of surgical outcome is increasingly important part of governance of surgical activity. The aim of the study. POSSUM scoring system was applied prospectively to determine how it performed in predicting morbidity and mortality in patients undergoing emergency laparotomy in our hospital, a group known to be at high risk of complications and death. Material and methods. A total of 100 cases of emergency laparotomies were studied in patients admitted in general surgery department during the period of May 2008 to August 2010. The study group consisted of the following cases. Duodenal perforation (37 cases, intestinal obstruction (27 cases, gastric perforation (8 cases, ileal perforation (8 cases, appendicular perforation (7 cases, blunt trauma (4 cases and others (9 cases. They were scored using POSSUM scoring system. Physiological scoring was done at the time of admission and operative scoring was done intraoperatively. They were followed up for the first 30 day post operative period for any complications and the outcome was noted. The observed morbidity and mortality rates were compared with the POSSUM predicted morbidity and mortality rates. Results. 15 patients died (mortality rate of 15%. The POSSUM predicted mortality was 20 deaths. O:E ratio of 0.71 was obtained. There was no statistically significant difference between the observed and predicted mortality rates (χ2=1.72, p=0.974. 71 patients experienced complications. The POSSUM predicted morbidity was 61 patients. O:E ratio of 1.19 was obtained. There was no statistically significant difference between the observed and predicted morbidity rates (χ2=1.594, p=0.991. Conclusions. POSSUM scoring is an accurate predictor of mortality and morbidity following emergency laparotomy and is a valid means of assessing adequacy of care provided to the patient. POSSUM can be used for surgical audit to assess and improve the quality of surgical care and helps in better outcome to the patient

Social rewards are important incentives for human behavior. This is especially true in team sports such as the most popular one worldwide: soccer. We investigated reward processing upon scoring a soccer goal in a standard two-versus-one situation and in comparison to winning in a monetary incentive task. The results show a strong overlap in brain activity between the two conditions in established reward regions of the mesolimbic dopaminergic system, including the ventral striatum and ventromedial pre-frontal cortex. The three main components of reward-associated learning, i.e., reward probability (RP), reward reception (RR) and reward prediction errors (RPE) showed highly similar activation in both con-texts, with only the RR and RPE components displaying overlapping reward activity. Passing and shooting behavior did not correlate with individual egoism scores, but we observe a positive correlation be-tween egoism and activity in the left middle frontal gyrus upon scoring after a pass versus a direct shot. Our findings suggest that rewards in the context of soccer and monetary incentives are based on similar neural processes. PMID:25875594

Full Text Available Social rewards are important incentives for human behavior. This is especially true in team sports such as the most popular one worldwide: soccer. We investigated reward processing upon scoring a soccer goal in a standard two-versus-one situation and in comparison to winning in a monetary incentive task. The results show a strong overlap in brain activity between the two conditions in established reward regions of the mesolimbic dopaminergic system, including the ventral striatum and ventromedial pre-frontal cortex. The three main components of reward-associated learning, i.e., reward probability (RP, reward reception (RR and reward prediction errors (RPE showed highly similar activation in both con-texts, with only the RR and RPE components displaying overlapping reward activity. Passing and shooting behavior did not correlate with individual egoism scores, but we observe a positive correlation be-tween egoism and activity in the left middle frontal gyrus upon scoring after a pass versus a direct shot. Our findings suggest that rewards in the context of soccer and monetary incentives are based on similar neural processes.

A series of four activities are presented to enhance students' abilities to appreciate and use trigonometry as a tool in problem solving. Activities cover problems applying the law of sines, the law of cosines, and matching equivalent trigonometric expressions. A teacher's guide, worksheets, and answers are provided. (MDH)

Full Text Available Objective: R-Baux score has obtained an acceptable validity and accuracy in predicting burn-related mortality. However, its usage and efficacy among pediatric burn patients has not been well documented. The aim of this study was to employ Pediatrics-Baux (P-Buax score as modified version of R-Baux score in these patients to determine how it could be applicable in this population.Methods: Through a prospective study, 870 pediatric burn patients were enrolled. P-Baux and R-Baux scores were calculated for each patient and they were categorized to different groups according to these scores. Mortality and further death probability were measured for each subject and then analyzed by logistic regression model to reveal how they change in relation with age in pediatric burn patients.Findings: R-Baux score for 95% probability of death revealed a mean of 73 among patients of this study. Also P-Baux score was measured in these patients with inhalation injury which showed to be 55 for 95% probability of death. Results showed that age had a positive prognostic value in contrast to the negative prognostic value of Total Body Surface Area (TBSA and inhalation injury.Conclusion: Our analysis showed that in children under the age of 15 years, age has a positive prognostic value while TBSA and inhalation injuries had negative prognostic values in relation to mortality. Hence, in contrast to the adult population, burn injury related mortality may be predicted by modified R-Baux score as (TBSA - age + [18×R] which could be named as P-Baux score.

Hormone receptor status is an integral component of decision-making in breast cancer management. IHC4 score is an algorithm that combines hormone receptor, HER2, and Ki-67 status to provide a semiquantitative prognostic score for breast cancer. High accuracy and low interobserver variance are important to ensure the score is accurately calculated; however, few previous efforts have been made to measure or decrease interobserver variance. We developed a Web-based training tool, called "Score the Core" (STC) using tissue microarrays to train pathologists to visually score estrogen receptor (using the 300-point H score), progesterone receptor (percent positive), and Ki-67 (percent positive). STC used a reference score calculated from a reproducible manual counting method. Pathologists in the Athena Breast Health Network and pathology residents at associated institutions completed the exercise. By using STC, pathologists improved their estrogen receptor H score and progesterone receptor and Ki-67 proportion assessment and demonstrated a good correlation between pathologist and reference scores. In addition, we collected information about pathologist performance that allowed us to compare individual pathologists and measures of agreement. Pathologists' assessment of the proportion of positive cells was closer to the reference than their assessment of the relative intensity of positive cells. Careful training and assessment should be used to ensure the accuracy of breast biomarkers. This is particularly important as breast cancer diagnostics become increasingly quantitative and reproducible. Our training tool is a novel approach for pathologist training that can serve as an important component of ongoing quality assessment and can improve the accuracy of breast cancer prognostic biomarkers. PMID:26410019

In an effort to improve cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk prediction, this analysis evaluates and compares the applicability of multiple CVD risk scores to the NASA Astronaut Corps which is extremely healthy at selection.

In most professional sports, playing field structure is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact environmental heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics or competitive advantages. Applying a novel generative model of scoring dynamics to roughly 10 million team competitions drawn from an online game, we quantify the relationship between the structure within a competition and its scoring dynamics, while controlling the impact of chance. Despite wide structural variations, we observe a common three-phase pattern in the tempo of events. Tempo and balance are highly predictable from a competition's structural features alone and teams exploit environmental heterogeneities for sustained competitive advantage. Surprisingly, the most balanced competitions are associated with specific environmental heterogeneities, not from equally skilled teams. These results shed new light on the design principles of balanced competition, and illustrate the potential of online game data for investigating social dynamics and competition.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce — Maps of relative classifications (low to high) for six resilience indicators and two anthropogenic stressors and a map of final relative resilience scores for 78...

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce — Maps of relative classifications (low to high) for six resilience indicators and two anthropogenic stressors and a map of final relative resilience scores for 78...

In most professional sports, the structure of the environment is kept neutral so that scoring imbalances may be attributed to differences in team skill. It thus remains unknown what impact structural heterogeneities can have on scoring dynamics and producing competitive advantages. Applying a generative model of scoring dynamics to roughly 10 million team competitions drawn from an online game, we quantify the relationship between a competition's structure and its scoring dynamics. Despite wide structural variations, we find the same three-phase pattern in the tempo of events observed in many sports. Tempo and balance are highly predictable from a competition's structural features alone and teams exploit environmental heterogeneities for sustained competitive advantage. The most balanced competitions are associated with specific environmental heterogeneities, not from equally skilled teams. These results shed new light on the principles of balanced competition, and illustrate the potential of online game data...

Full Text Available Introduction. A family history of Alzheimer’s disease is a significant risk factor for its onset, but the genetic risk associated with possessing multiple risk alleles is still poorly understood. Methods. In a sample of 95 older adults (Mean age = 75.1, 64.2% female, we constructed a genetic risk score based on the accumulation of risk alleles in BDNF, COMT, and APOE. A neuropsychological evaluation and consensus determined cognitive status (44 nonimpaired, 51 impaired. Logistic regression was performed to determine whether the genetic risk score predicted cognitive impairment above and beyond that associated with each gene. Results. An increased genetic risk score was associated with a nearly 4-fold increased risk of cognitive impairment (OR = 3.824, P = .013 when including the individual gene polymorphisms as covariates in the model. Discussion. A risk score combining multiple genetic influences may be more useful in predicting late-life cognitive impairment than individual polymorphisms.

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services — A list of hospitals participating in the Hospital VBP Program and their performance rates and scores for the Clinical Process of Care Heart Failure measures.

Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is characterized by synovial inflammation, with potential risk of developing progressive joint destruction. Personalized state-of-the-art treatment depends on valid markers for disease activity to monitor response; however, no such markers exist. To evaluate the reliability of scoring of carpal bone erosions on MR in children with JIA using two semi-quantitative scoring systems. A total of 1,236 carpal bones (91 MR wrist examinations) were scored twice by two independent pediatric musculoskeletal radiologists. Bony erosions were scored according to estimated bone volume loss using a 0-4 scale and a 0-10 scale. An aggregate erosion score comprising the sum total carpal bone volume loss was calculated for each examination. The 0-4 scoring system resulted in good intra-reader agreement and moderate to good inter-observer agreement in the assessment of individual bones. Fair and moderate agreement were achieved for inter-reader and intra-reader agreement, respectively, using the 0-10 scale. Intra- and particularly inter-reader aggregate score variability were much less favorable, with wide limits of agreement. Further analysis of erosive disease patterns compared with normal subjects is required, and to facilitate the development of an alternative means of quantifying disease. (orig.)

Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) is characterized by synovial inflammation, with potential risk of developing progressive joint destruction. Personalized state-of-the-art treatment depends on valid markers for disease activity to monitor response; however, no such markers exist. To evaluate the reliability of scoring of carpal bone erosions on MR in children with JIA using two semi-quantitative scoring systems. A total of 1,236 carpal bones (91 MR wrist examinations) were scored twice by two independent pediatric musculoskeletal radiologists. Bony erosions were scored according to estimated bone volume loss using a 0-4 scale and a 0-10 scale. An aggregate erosion score comprising the sum total carpal bone volume loss was calculated for each examination. The 0-4 scoring system resulted in good intra-reader agreement and moderate to good inter-observer agreement in the assessment of individual bones. Fair and moderate agreement were achieved for inter-reader and intra-reader agreement, respectively, using the 0-10 scale. Intra- and particularly inter-reader aggregate score variability were much less favorable, with wide limits of agreement. Further analysis of erosive disease patterns compared with normal subjects is required, and to facilitate the development of an alternative means of quantifying disease. (orig.)

We investigate the order of the variance of the optimal alignments (OA) score of two independent iid binary random words having the same length. The letters are equiprobable, but the scoring function is such that one letter has a larger score than the other. In this setting, we prove that the order of variance is linear in the common length. OAs constitute a generalization of longest common subsequences, they can be represented as optimal paths in a two-dimensional last passage percolation setting with dependent weights.

In recent years commercial banks have moved toward automated forms of underwriting. This study employs unique bank loan-level data from a scoring lender to determine whether automated underwriting exhibits a potential ‘‘disparate impact’’ across income strata. The findings indicate that strict application of this custom scoring model leads to higher denial rates for low- to moderate-income borrowers when compared with both a naıÂ¨ve judgmental system and a bureau scoring approach. These resul...

This paper investigates the effects of credit scores on consumer payment behavior, especially on debit and credit card use. Anecdotally, a negative relationship between debit card use and credit score has been reported; however, it is not clear whether that relationship is related to other factors, such as education or income, or whether it is a mere correlation. We use a new consumer survey dataset to examine whether this negative relationship holds after controlling for various consumer cha...

This study quantifies the disadvantage in the formation of literacy skills of immigrants that arises from the linguistic distance between mother tongue and host country language. Combining unique cross-country data on literacy scores with information on the linguistic distance between languages, gaps in literacy test scores are estimated. Linguistically distant immigrants face significant initial disadvantages of linguistic origin that exceed existing differentials across wage distributions a...

In soccer, scoring goals is a fundamental objective which depends on many conditions and constraints. Considering the RoboCup soccer 2D-simulator, this paper presents a data mining-based decision system to identify the best time and direction to kick the ball towards the goal to maximize the overall chances of scoring during a simulated soccer match. Following the CRISP-DM methodology, data for modeling were extracted from matches of major international tournaments (10691 kicks), knowledge ab...

The traditional method for creating a gene score to predict a given outcome is to use the most statistically significant single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) from all SNPs which were tested. There are several disadvantages of this approach such as excluding SNPs that do not have strong single effects when tested on their own but do have strong joint effects when tested together with other SNPs. The interpretation of results from the traditional gene score may lack biological insight since t...

Abstract Background Over-diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer has been a major problem in prostate cancer care and management. Currently the most relevant prognostic factor to predict a patient's risk of death due to prostate cancer is the Gleason score of the biopsied tissue samples. However, pathological analysis is subjective, and the Gleason score is only a qualitative estimate of the cancer malignancy. Molecular biomarkers and diagnostic tests that can accurately predict prostate t...

Mortgage originators use credit score cutoff rules to determine how carefully to screen loan applicants. Recent research has hypothesized that these cutoff rules result from a securitization rule of thumb. Under this theory, an observed jump in defaults at the cutoff would imply that securitization led to lax screening. We argue instead that originators adopted credit score cutoff rules in response to underwriting guidelines from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and offer a simple model that ration...

Models in the geosciences are generally surrounded by uncertainty, and being able to quantify this uncertainty is key to good decision making. Accordingly, probabilistic forecasts in the form of predictive distributions have become popular over the last decades. With the proliferation of probabilistic models arises the need for decision theoretically principled tools to evaluate the appropriateness of models and forecasts in a generalized way. Various scoring rules have been developed over the past decades to address this demand. Proper scoring rules are functions S(F,y) which evaluate the accuracy of a forecast distribution F , given that an outcome y was observed. As such, they allow to compare alternative models, a crucial ability given the variety of theories, data sources and statistical specifications that is available in many situations. This poster presents the software package scoringRules for the statistical programming language R, which contains functions to compute popular scoring rules such as the continuous ranked probability score for a variety of distributions F that come up in applied work. Two main classes are parametric distributions like normal, t, or gamma distributions, and distributions that are not known analytically, but are indirectly described through a sample of simulation draws. For example, Bayesian forecasts produced via Markov Chain Monte Carlo take this form. Thereby, the scoringRules package provides a framework for generalized model evaluation that both includes Bayesian as well as classical parametric models. The scoringRules package aims to be a convenient dictionary-like reference for computing scoring rules. We offer state of the art implementations of several known (but not routinely applied) formulas, and implement closed-form expressions that were previously unavailable. Whenever more than one implementation variant exists, we offer statistically principled default choices.

Measuring the impact of tax policy on tax evasion is crucial in estimating government revenues. In the United States, the government estimates that $300–$400 billion is lost each year to tax evasion. This article combines dynamic scoring with household preferences for tax evasion à la Feige and McGee to measure the macroeconomic feedback effects from tax cuts to changes in output and government revenues. Using a simple dynamic scoring model based on Mankiw and Weinzierl (2006), the feedback e...

The goal of this study was to compare five actigraphy scoring methods in a sample of 18 remitted patients with bipolar disorder. Actigraphy records were processed using five different scoring methods relying on the sleep diary; the event-marker; the software-provided automatic algorithm; the automatic algorithm supplemented by the event-marker; visual inspection (VI) only. The Algorithm and the VI methods differed from the other methods for many actigraphy parameters of interest. Particularly...

Confounding can be a major source of bias in non-experimental research. The authors recently introduced propensity score calibration (PSC), which combines propensity scores (PS) and regression calibration to address confounding by variables unobserved in the main study by using variables observed in a validation study. Here, the authors assess the performance of PSC using simulations in settings with and without violation of the key assumption of PSC: that the error-prone PS estimated in the ...

This paper suggests a simple approximation procedure for the assessment of productivity scores with respect to fuzzy production plans. The procedure has a clear economic interpretation and all the necessary calculations can be performed in a spreadsheet making it highly operational......This paper suggests a simple approximation procedure for the assessment of productivity scores with respect to fuzzy production plans. The procedure has a clear economic interpretation and all the necessary calculations can be performed in a spreadsheet making it highly operational...

Estimators with cube root asymptotics are typically the result of M-estimation with non-smooth objective functions. Aside from being inefficient, they are hard to calculate, have intractable limiting distributions, and are unamenable to the bootstrap. Manski's maximum score estimator and irregular histograms receive special attention. We investigate the geometry, algorithmics and robustness properties of Manski's maximum score estimator, a semiparametric estimator of the coefficients in the b...

Purpose For measuring symptoms of fecal incontinence, summary scoring systems are widely used, but rigorous psychometric validation or assessment of such systems in terms of patients' subjective perception has rarely been done to date. This study was designed to assess the correlation between each severity measure and patients' subjective perception or clinicians' clinical assessment. We attempted to compare summary scoring systems of severity measures and searched for which of them showed hi...

Context Anxiety disorders are common, with a lifetime prevalence of 20% in the U.S., and are responsible for substantial burdens of disability, missed work days and health care utilization. To date, no causal genetic variants have been identified for anxiety, anxiety disorders, or related traits. Objective: To investigate whether a phobic anxiety symptom score was associated with 3 alternative polygenic risk scores, derived from external genome-wide association studies of anxiety, an internal...

Purpose The aim of this study was to evaluate the relationship between maternal periodontal disease and the health status of newborns using Apgar scores. Methods One hundred pregnant women with periodontal disease were included in the case series and 100 pregnant women without periodontal disease were placed in the control group, respectively. The periodontal parameters of bleeding on probing (BOP), clinical attachment loss (CAL), probing depth (PD), birth weight, and Apgar scores were record...

Accurate credit-granting decisions are crucial to the efficiency of the decentralized capital allocation mechanisms in modern market economies. Credit bureaus and many financial institutions have developed and used credit-scoring models to standardize and automate, to the extent possible, credit decisions. We build credit scoring models for bankcard markets using the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Risk Analysis Division (OCC/RAD) consumer credit database (CCDB). This unusually ric...

This study describes the loan products offered by commercial banks and credit scoring techniques used for classifying risks and granting credit to applicants in India. Loan products offered by commercial banks are from several kinds, since housing loans, personal loans, business loans until education loans or vehicle loans, among many other types. All loan products are categorized either as secured or unsecured loans. Credit scoring techniques used for both secured and unsecured loans are bro...

Abstract Background Inadequate eating behavior and physical inactivity contribute to the current epidemic of childhood obesity. The aim of this study was to assess the association between eating behavior scores and childhood obesity in Chilean children. Design and methods We recruited 126 obese, 44 overweight and 124 normal-weight Chilean children (6-12 years-old; both genders) according to the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF) criteria. Eating behavior scores were calculated using the ...

We consider probability distributions of alternative lod statistics, differing in their treatment of segregation parameters when mode of inheritance is uncertain. A particular pedigree structure and a dominant genetic system displaying incomplete penetrance are analyzed. Lod scores calculated assuming an incorrect segregation model appear to conform quite well to the chi 2 distribution in the absence of linkage. In the presence of linkage, some power is lost. However, if lod scores are calcul...

The ROC curve is one of the most widely used visual tool to evaluate performance of scoring functions regarding their capacities to discriminate between two populations. It is the goal of this paper to propose a statistical learning method for constructing a scoring function with nearly optimal ROC curve. In this bipartite setup, the target is known to be the regression function up to an increasing transform and solving the optimization problem boils down to recovering the collection of level...

) walking ability - was assessed by two independent physiotherapists at postoperative median day 3. Each activity was assessed on a three-point ordinal scale from 0 (not able to) to 2 (independent of human assistance). The cumulated score for each activity provides a total CAS from 0 to 6, with 6 indicating...

Full Text Available Risk management is one of the most important branches of business and finance. Classification models are the most popular and widely used analytical group of data mining approaches that can greatly help financial decision makers and managers to tackle credit risk problems. However, the literature clearly indicates that, despite proposing numerous classification models, credit scoring is often a difficult task. On the other hand, there is no universal credit-scoring model in the literature that can be accurately and explanatorily used in all circumstances. Therefore, the research for improving the efficiency of credit-scoring models has never stopped. In this paper, a hybrid soft intelligent classification model is proposed for credit-scoring problems. In the proposed model, the unique advantages of the soft computing techniques are used in order to modify the performance of the traditional artificial neural networks in credit scoring. Empirical results of Australian credit card data classifications indicate that the proposed hybrid model outperforms its components, and also other classification models presented for credit scoring. Therefore, the proposed model can be considered as an appropriate alternative tool for binary decision making in business and finance, especially in high uncertainty conditions.

High School Modeling Workshops are designed to improve high school physics teachers' understanding of physics and how to teach using the Modeling method. The basic assumption is that the teacher plays a critical role in their students' physics education. This study investigated teacher impacts on students' Force Concept Inventory scores, (FCI), with the hopes of identifying quantitative differences between teachers. This study examined student FCI scores from 18 teachers with at least a year of teaching high school physics. This data was then evaluated using a General Linear Model (GLM), which allowed for a regression equation to be fitted to the data. This regression equation was used to predict student post FCI scores, based on: teacher ID, student pre FCI score, gender, and representation. The results show 12 out of 18 teachers significantly impact their student post FCI scores. The GLM further revealed that of the 12 teachers only five have a positive impact on student post FCI scores. Given these differences among teachers it is our intention to extend our analysis to investigate pedagogical differences between them.

Full Text Available An effective risk stratification which could help us identify high-risk patients who should take oral anticoagulants (OACs is the key step for stroke prevention in atrial fibrillation (AF. Several scoring systems were available to estimate the risk of stroke in AF, including CHADS2, CHA2DS2-VASc, R2CHADS2 and ATRIA scores, which were constituted of different clinical risk factors. Recently, several new OACs (NOACs were demonstrated to be at least as effective as warfarin in stroke prevention and were much safer regarding the risk of intra-cranial hemorrhage. In the era of NOACs, the roles of scoring schemes have shifted to identify patinets with a truly low-risk of thromboembolic events, in whom OACs were not recommended. The CHA2DS2-VASc score is powerful in selecting “truly low-risk” patients who are not necessary to receive anticoagulation therapies. Whether the new-emerging scoring systems, R2CHADS2 and ATRIA scores, could further improve the stroke prediction in AF deserves a further study.

Contrast-induced nephropathy (CIN) is an important cause of acute renal failure. Identification of risk factors of CIN and creating a simple risk scoring for CIN after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is important. A prospective single center study was conducted in Kuwait chest disease hospital. All patients admitted to chest disease hospital for PCI from March to May 2005 were included in the study. Total of 247 patients were randomly assigned for the development dataset and 100 for the validation set using the simple random method. The overall occurrence of CIN in the development set was 5.52%. Using multivariate analysis; basal Serum creatinine, shock, female gender, multivessel PCI, and diabetes mellitus were identified as risk factors. Scores assigned to different variables yielded basal creatinine > 115 micron mol/L with the highest score(7), followed by shock (3), female gender, multivessel PCI and diabetes mellitus had the same score (2). Patients were further risk stratified into low risk score (12). The developed CIN model demonstrated good discriminative power in the validation population. In conclusion, use of a simple risk score for CIN can predict the probability of CIN after PCI; this however needs further validation in larger multicenter trials. (author)

Professional team sports provide an excellent domain for studying the dynamics of social competitions. These games are constructed with simple, well-defined rules and payoffs that admit a high-dimensional set of possible actions and nontrivial scoring dynamics. The resulting gameplay and efforts to predict its evolution are the object of great interest to both sports professionals and enthusiasts. In this paper, we consider two online prediction problems for team sports:~given a partially observed game Who will score next? and ultimately Who will win? We present novel interpretable generative models of within-game scoring that allow for dependence on lead size (restoration) and on the last team to score (anti-persistence). We then apply these models to comprehensive within-game scoring data for four sports leagues over a ten year period. By assessing these models' relative goodness-of-fit we shed new light on the underlying mechanisms driving the observed scoring dynamics of each sport. Furthermore, in both p...

Semi quantitative MRI is a very useful procedure for evaluating the bone marrow burden (BMB) in Gaucher disease (GD). Score systems have been applied to obtain a parameter for evaluating the severity of bone disease. Our purpose was to test a simple, reproducible and accurate score to evaluate bone marrow involvement in GD patients. MRI was performed in spine, pelvis and femora at diagnosis in 54 adult GD1 patients, 61.1% of whom were female. Three MRI patterns and punctuation in each location were defined: normal, 0; non-homogeneous infiltration subtypes reticular, 1; mottled, 2; diffuse, 3; and homogeneous infiltration, 4. This score was called Spanish-MRI (S-MRI). Two independent observers applied the S-MRI and bone marrow burden score and compared the differences using the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test. Correlation rank test was calculated. In 46 patients (85.2%), bone involvement was observed. Thirty-nine (72.3%) had their spine affected, 35 (64.8%) pelvis and 33 (61.2%) femora. Fourteen patients had bone infarcts, 14 avascular necrosis, 2 vertebral fractures and 2 bone crises. Correlation analysis between S-MRI and BMB was (r {sup 2} = .675; p = .0001). No evidence of correlation was observed between CT activity and S-MRI nor between CT activity and BMB. We have found a relationship between genotype and bone infiltration according to S-MRI site and complications. S-MRI is a simple method that provides useful information to evaluate bone infiltration and detect silent complications. Our results correlated with the BMB score but offer higher sensitivity, specificity and accuracy for classifying the extent of bone disease.

Full Text Available Background: Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH is one of the most common disease in ageing men and can be associated with Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms (LUTS that affect quality of life by interfering with normal daily activities. The American Urological Association Symptoms Index (AUA-SI is recommended as symptom scoring instrument to be used in initial assessment of each patient presenting with symptoms of prostatism. Objective: To assess the severity of symptoms in Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia subjects by using AUA symptom score in rural population of Lucknow, U.P. Materials and Methods: It is a rural community based cross-sectional study (2008-2009 conducted in the field practice area of Rural Health Training Centre (RHTC of Community Medicine department, CSM Medical University UP, Lucknow. The study covered three villages by doing house to house survey. All males of 45 years and above were contacted and information regarding bio-social characteristics taken by using pre-tested questionnaire. Information regarding LUTS was gathered using AUA symptom score questionnaire. Data was analyzed using chi square test. Results:The prevalence of BPH amongst males aged 45 years and above in the rural area studied was 11.8%. The prevalence of BPH was maximum (62.5% in the age group of 75 years and above. About 60% BPH patient aged > 75 years was found to have AUA symptom score of moderate grade (8to19, whereas only 25% BPH aged 45-54 years were having same grade of AUA symptom score. In the present study, out of 66 patients only 23 (34.8% had moderate AUA symptom score and 43 had mild (1-7 AUA symptom score. No one had severe symptom score. Conclusions: Only 34.8% BPH cases were found to have moderate symptoms and awareness of prostate swelling seems to be much poor even after consultation. For proper management of subjects with moderate to severe symptoms, public health awareness campaigns and annual surgical camp must bearrange in rural area.

Social rewards are important incentives for human behavior. This is especially true in team sports such as the most popular one worldwide: soccer. We investigated reward processing upon scoring a soccer goal in a standard two-versus-one situation and in comparison to winning in a monetary incentive task. The results show a strong overlap in brain activity between the two conditions in established reward regions of the mesolimbic dopaminergic system, including the ventral striatum and ventrome...

Monitoring of surgical outcome is increasingly important part of governance of surgical activity. The aim of the study. POSSUM scoring system was applied prospectively to determine how it performed in predicting morbidity and mortality in patients undergoing emergency laparotomy in our hospital, a group known to be at high risk of complications and death. Material and methods. A total of 100 cases of emergency laparotomies were studied in patients admitted in general surgery department during...

The use of massive open online courses (MOOCs) to expand students’ access to higher education has raised questions regarding the extent to which this course model can provide and assess authentic, higher level student learning. In response to this need, MOOC platforms have begun utilizing automated essay scoring (AES) systems that allow students to engage in critical writing and free-response activities. However, there is a lack of research investigating the validity of such systems in MOOCs....

Abstract Background Marbling score (MS) is the major quantitative trait that affects carcass quality in beef cattle. In this study, we examined the association between genetic polymorphisms of the micromolar calcium-activated neutral protease gene (micro-calpain, CAPN1) and carcass traits in Korean cattle (also known as Hanwoo). Results By direct DNA sequencing in 24 unrelated Korean cattle, we identified 39 sequence variants within exons and their flanking regions in CAPN1. Among them, 12 co...

Background: Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia (BPH) is one of the most common disease in ageing men and can be associated with Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms (LUTS) that affect quality of life by interfering with normal daily activities. The American Urological Association Symptoms Index (AUA-SI) is recommended as symptom scoring instrument to be used in initial assessment of each patient presenting with symptoms of prostatism. Objective: To assess the severity of symptoms in Benign Prostatic Hy...

The aim of this study was to develop a fully automatic sleep scoring algorithm on the basis of a reproduction of new international sleep scoring criteria from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. A biomedical signal processing algorithm was developed, allowing for automatic sleep depth....... Based on an observed reliability of the manual scorer of 92.5% (Cohen's Kappa: 0.87) in the normal group and 85.3% (Cohen's Kappa: 0.73) in the abnormal group, this study concluded that although the developed algorithm was capable of scoring normal sleep with an accuracy around the manual interscorer...... reliability, it failed in accurately scoring abnormal sleep as encountered for the Parkinson disease/multiple system atrophy patients....

The aim of this study was to develop a fully automatic sleep scoring algorithm on the basis of a reproduction of new international sleep scoring criteria from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. A biomedical signal processing algorithm was developed, allowing for automatic sleep depth....... Based on an observed reliability of the manual scorer of 92.5% (Cohen's Kappa: 0.87) in the normal group and 85.3% (Cohen's Kappa: 0.73) in the abnormal group, this study concluded that although the developed algorithm was capable of scoring normal sleep with an accuracy around the manual interscorer...... reliability, it failed in accurately scoring abnormal sleep as encountered for the Parkinson disease/multiple system atrophy patients....

Introduction: Reliable polysomnographic classification is the basis for evaluation of sleep disorders in neurological diseases. Aim: To develop a fully automatic sleep scoring algorithm on the basis of a reproduction of new international sleep scoring criteria from the American Academy of Sleep...... Medicine (AASM). Methods: A biomedical signal processing algorithm was developed, allowing for automatic sleep depth quantification of routine polysomnographic (PSG) recordings through feature extraction, supervised probabilistic Bayesian classification, and heuristic rule-based smoothing. The performance...... abnormal group. Conclusion: The developed algorithm was capable of scoring normal sleep with an accuracy around the manual inter-scorer reliability, it failed in accurately scoring abnormal sleep as encountered for the PD/MSA patients, which is due to the abnormal micro- and macrostructure pattern in these...

Full Text Available Knee osteoarthritis (OA is the most common joint disease of adults worldwide. Since the treatments for advanced radiographic knee OA are limited, clinicians face a significant challenge of identifying patients who are at high risk of OA in a timely and appropriate way. Therefore, we developed a simple self-assessment scoring system and an improved artificial neural network (ANN model for knee OA.The Fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (KNHANES V-1 data were used to develop a scoring system and ANN for radiographic knee OA. A logistic regression analysis was used to determine the predictors of the scoring system. The ANN was constructed using 1777 participants and validated internally on 888 participants in the KNHANES V-1. The predictors of the scoring system were selected as the inputs of the ANN. External validation was performed using 4731 participants in the Osteoarthritis Initiative (OAI. Area under the curve (AUC of the receiver operating characteristic was calculated to compare the prediction models.The scoring system and ANN were built using the independent predictors including sex, age, body mass index, educational status, hypertension, moderate physical activity, and knee pain. In the internal validation, both scoring system and ANN predicted radiographic knee OA (AUC 0.73 versus 0.81, p<0.001 and symptomatic knee OA (AUC 0.88 versus 0.94, p<0.001 with good discriminative ability. In the external validation, both scoring system and ANN showed lower discriminative ability in predicting radiographic knee OA (AUC 0.62 versus 0.67, p<0.001 and symptomatic knee OA (AUC 0.70 versus 0.76, p<0.001.The self-assessment scoring system may be useful for identifying the adults at high risk for knee OA. The performance of the scoring system is improved significantly by the ANN. We provided an ANN calculator to simply predict the knee OA risk.

Protein–protein complexes play key roles in all cellular signal transduction processes. We have developed a fast and accurate computational approach to predict changes in the binding free energy upon alanine mutations in protein–protein interfaces. The approach is based on a knowledge-based scoring function, DrugScorePPI, for which pair potentials were derived from 851 complex structures and adapted against 309 experimental alanine scanning results. Based on this approach, we developed the Dr...

Full Text Available Every year, with special aptitude exams students are taken to undergraduate programs as a music teacher in Turkey .Although applications for these exam show differences according to the difficulty level of the questions and evaluations criterias, all the areas that would be measured show similarities to each other. The areas showing the similarity are classified as Musical hearing-reading-writing fields (MİOY , musical playing area and musical singing area. Special Ability Test score (ÖYSP Transition to Higher Education Exam scores, as well as forming the points (YGS-P and the weighted scores of Secondary Education (AOBP takes place mainly among the scores of the candidates. It is used according to the circumstances of different coefficients Placement Scores (YP in the calculation. The types of score that form YGS-P and ÖYS, which mainly affect the placemet of the students to the university, the relationship between the musical areas in ÖYSP and all correlations of the areas to each other have been seen as a basical problem of this study.761 candidates who auditioned for Music Education Program in the years 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 academic Inonu University Faculty of Education constitutes the study group . As a result of the analysis made, between the MİOY scores and YGS-P there is a meaningful relationship in positive direction and low level (r =. 08, p scores of MİOY there are positive direction, the low level (r = .21, p

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of spatial resolution on coronary calcium scoring by x-ray CT, to assess the scoring performance of different CT scanners as they are operated in the field and to correct for the effects of CT scanner spatial resolution on coronary calcium scoring. A phantom consisting of five aluminium wires of known diameter in water was used to measure spatial resolution and to assess scoring performance. Fourteen CT scanners (three helical, two dual, two electron-beam and seven multi-detector) from four manufacturers were evaluated, some under different operating conditions. One scanner was monitored over a 3 month period and again 6 months later. Both spatial resolution and image pixel size significantly affect calcium scoring results. Spatial resolution can be measured with a precision of about 2%. Scanner spatial resolution ranged from 1 to 1.7 mm full-width-half-maximum (FWHM), and pixel size from 0.25 to 0.86 mm. Spatial resolution differences introduce systematic scoring differences that range from 38% to 1100% depending on wire size. Significant temporal variations in spatial resolution were observed in the monitored scanner. By correcting all the scanners to the same target spatial resolution, the standard deviation of individual scanners with respect to a mean value (the spread) can be reduced by 25-70% for different wires. In conclusion, scanner spatial resolution significantly affects calcium scoring and should be controlled for. Scanner performance can change over time. Under ideal conditions, CT scanners should be operated with a standard spatial resolution for calcium scoring. When this is not possible, post-processing correction is a viable alternative

Spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage (SICH) still presents a great heterogeneity in its clinical evaluation, demonstrating differences in the enrollment criteria used for the study of intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) treatment. The aim of the current study was to assess the ICH Score, a simple and reliable scale, determining the 30-day mortality and the one-year functional outcome. Consecutive patients admitted with acute SICH were prospectively included in the study. ICH Scores ranged from 0 t...

Post amputation pain can be debilitating for patients and families. Chronic pain is a common phenomenon after lower extremity amputation, occurring in up to 80% of this population. The purpose of this pilot study was to correlate post amputation pain scores to opioid analgesic consumption and Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) scores. Twenty-three patients with lower extremity amputation at an 827-bed acute care inner-city hospital were surveyed pre-operatively and post-operatively to determine if ...

Systems of many interacting components, as found in physics, biology, infrastructure, and the social sciences, are often modeled by simple networks of nodes and edges. The real-world systems frequently confront outside intervention or internal damage whose impact must be predicted or minimized, and such perturbations are then mimicked in the models by altering nodes or edges. This leads to the broad issue of how to best quantify changes in a model network after some type of perturbation. In the case of node removal there are many centrality metrics which associate a scalar quantity with the removed node, but it can be difficult to associate the quantities with some intuitive aspect of physical behavior in the network. This presents a serious hurdle to the application of network theory: real-world utility networks are rarely altered according to theoretic principles unless the kinetic impact on the network's users are fully appreciated beforehand. In pursuit of a kinetically interpretable centrality score, we discuss the f-score, or frustration score. Each f-score quantifies whether a selected node accelerates or inhibits global mean first passage times to a second, independently selected target node. We show that this is a natural way of revealing the dynamical importance of a node in some networks. After discussing merits of the f-score metric, we combine spectral and Laplacian matrix theory in order to quickly approximate the exact f-score values, which can otherwise be expensive to compute. Following tests on both synthetic and real medium-sized networks, we report f-score runtime improvements over exact brute force approaches in the range of 0 to 400 % with low error (<3 % ).

Systems of many interacting components, as found in physics, biology, infrastructure, and the social sciences, are often modeled by simple networks of nodes and edges. The real-world systems frequently confront outside intervention or internal damage whose impact must be predicted or minimized, and such perturbations are then mimicked in the models by altering nodes or edges. This leads to the broad issue of how to best quantify changes in a model network after some type of perturbation. In the case of node removal there are many centrality metrics which associate a scalar quantity with the removed node, but it can be difficult to associate the quantities with some intuitive aspect of physical behavior in the network. This presents a serious hurdle to the application of network theory: real-world utility networks are rarely altered according to theoretic principles unless the kinetic impact on the network’s users are fully appreciated beforehand. In pursuit of a kinetically-interpretable centrality score, we discuss the f-score, or frustration score. Each f-score quantifies whether a selected node accelerates or inhibits global mean first passage times to a second, independently-selected target node. We show that this is a natural way of revealing the dynamical importance of a node in some networks. After discussing merits of the f-score metric, we combine spectral and Laplacian matrix theory in order to quickly approximate the exact f-score values, which can otherwise be expensive to compute. Following tests on both synthetic and real medium-sized networks, we report f-score runtime improvements over exact brute force approaches in the range of 0 to 400% with low error (< 3%). PMID:26764743

Full Text Available Abstract Background Inadequate eating behavior and physical inactivity contribute to the current epidemic of childhood obesity. The aim of this study was to assess the association between eating behavior scores and childhood obesity in Chilean children. Design and methods We recruited 126 obese, 44 overweight and 124 normal-weight Chilean children (6-12 years-old; both genders according to the International Obesity Task Force (IOTF criteria. Eating behavior scores were calculated using the Child Eating Behavior Questionnaire (CEBQ. Factorial analysis in the culturally-adapted questionnaire for Chilean population was used to confirm the original eight-factor structure of CEBQ. The Cronbach's alpha statistic (>0.7 in most subscales was used to assess internal consistency. Non-parametric methods were used to assess case-control associations. Results Eating behavior scores were strongly associated with childhood obesity in Chilean children. Childhood obesity was directly associated with high scores in the subscales "enjoyment of food" (P Conclusion Our study shows a strong and graded association between specific eating behavior scores and childhood obesity in Chile.

Full Text Available Background Sepsis remains a major cause of morbidity andmortality among critically ill children in the pediatric intensivecare unit (PICU. Procalcitonin and lactate have been used asbiomarkers of sepsis, as they have been correlated with diseaseseverity, organ failure and death. The Pediatric Logistic OrganDysfunction (PELOD score is a tool to assess the severity oforgan dysfunction in critically ill children.Objective To investigate the correlation between PELOD scoreand procalcitonin and lactate levels in pediatric sepsis.Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted in childrenwith sepsis who were admitted to the PICU from April to July2012. Sepsis was defined as systemic inflammatory responsesyndrome (SIRS, as a result of suspected or proven infection.Proven infection was defined as positive culture findings (blood, mL. Spearman’s test was used to assess for correlations betweenPELOD scores and procalcitonin as well as lactate levels.Results Thirty-two patients were analyzed, consisting of 18 malesand 14 females with an age range of 1-432 months (median 21months. There was no statistically significant correlation betweenprocalcitonin level and PELOD score (r=- 0.186, 95%CI -0.502to 0.174, P=0.308 nor between lactate level(r=-0.069, 95%CI-0.408 to 0.287, P=0.709 and PELOD score.Conclusion Serum procalcitonin and lactate levels are notcorrelated with PELOD scores in children with sepsis.

Osteoporosis becomes common with aging in both sexes, but is often ignored in men. The 2013 International Society for Clinical Densitometry consensus conference endorsed a Caucasian female referent database for T-score calculation in men. This recommendation has generated controversy and concern. Accumulating data indicate that at the same DXA-measured body mineral density (BMD) (g/cm(2)), men and women are at approximately the same fracture risk. With this point in mind, using the same database to derive the T-score in men and women is reasonable. As a result, a greater proportion of men who sustain a fragility fracture will have T-scores that are higher than they would if a male database were used; in fact, many men will fracture at T-scores that are "normal." This highlights the importance of diagnosing osteoporosis not just by T-score, but also by the presence of fragility fracture and/or by estimations of fracture risk as generated by tools such as the FRAX calculator. The practical consequences of this change in densitometric definition of osteoporosis in men should be monitored, including the proportion of men at risk identified and treated as well as defining the response to treatment in those assessed by this more comprehensive approach. PMID:25255867

The relationships between mathematical SAT scores (SAT-M) and grades earned by students in eight consecutive years of first- and second-semester general chemistry courses at Oberlin College are reported. The academic years surveyed are 1987-1988 through 1994-1995. SAT-M scores are grouped within seven ranges from 450 and less to 710-800. Within any range of scores, students in both courses earned a wide variety of grades, but those within the higher ranges tended to earn higher grades and fewer failures relative to students in the lower ranges. For all students within each range of SAT-M scores, the fraction earning each grade are calculated. These fractions along with the numbers of students and their SAT-M scores in a subset are used to calculate grades expected for that subset. In the first-semester course, the expected and actual grades for subsets of males, females, first-year students, non-first-year students, Asians, Blacks, and Latinos are not significantly different. Those who eventually majored in chemistry or biochemistry attained grades very significantly higher than expected. Most students tended to achieve grades in the second-semester course that were similar to those earned in the first-semester course.

At present, a correct and thorough risk evaluation represents the best prognostic and therapeutic approach for hypertensive patients. Recent European and American guidelines recommend a global stratification of the cardiovascular risk of hypertensive patients, based on the evaluation of risk factors, organ damage, and the clinical conditions associated with hypertension. A similar approach uses numerical risk scores that transform the percentage risk, calculated from large populations, into absolute values. These scores have been calculated by different research groups and scientific organizations with the aim of better defining the real risk of a given population over time. Many of these risk scores have been conceived by American and European scientific groups on the basis of the epidemiology of different risk variables in the respective populations; in general, north American hypertensives are exposed to a higher cardiovascular risk compared to Europeans and some European countries have a higher risk than others. The present review underlines the pivotal role of a correct risk evaluation of hypertension as reported in the guidelines. We briefly analyze the principal studies on risk scores: we compare the advantages and disadvantages of the different scores, as well as the similarities and differences, in order to demonstrate not only their utility, but also the possible equivalence of the different parameters considered. PMID:15568607

Humans are highly social animals and often help unrelated individuals that may never reciprocate the altruist's favour. This apparent evolutionary puzzle may be explained by the altruist's gain in social image: image-scoring bystanders, also known as eavesdroppers, notice the altruistic act and therefore are more likely to help the altruist in the future. Such complex indirect reciprocity based on altruistic acts may evolve only after simple indirect reciprocity has been established, which requires two steps. First, image scoring evolves when bystanders gain personal benefits from information gathered, for example, by finding cooperative partners. Second, altruistic behaviour in the presence of such bystanders may evolve if altruists benefit from access to the bystanders. Here, we provide experimental evidence for both of the requirements in a cleaning mutualism involving the cleaner fish Labroides dimidiatus. These cleaners may cooperate and remove ectoparasites from clients or they may cheat by feeding on client mucus. As mucus may be preferred over typical client ectoparasites, clients must make cleaners feed against their preference to obtain a cooperative service. We found that eavesdropping clients spent more time next to 'cooperative' than 'unknown cooperative level' cleaners, which shows that clients engage in image-scoring behaviour. Furthermore, trained cleaners learned to feed more cooperatively when in an 'image-scoring' than in a 'non-image-scoring' situation. PMID:16791194

The need for protection mechanisms for multimedia content is widely recognized. In the past digital watermarking algorithms for images have been developed that provide a certain level of protection for colored or gray-scale images. Since classical raster-oriented watermarking algorithms do not satisfy the needs for symbol oriented music score images we present in this paper a solution that should give promising robustness of the watermark at minimal visibility impact. This solution respects the content of binary images and can be considered as a symbolic interpretation and modification of music scores. Some music symbols are used by changing their features for hiding an information string in a music score. The advantage is its robustness and invisibility. Regarding the invisibility a musician should under no circumstances be impeded in reading the music. One must even consider the fact of being influenced unconsciously. For example, it might be more difficult to concentrate on a music sheet if the symbols were changed invisibly. The most probable way of distributing music scores is the analog (paper) form. Music scores are copied and distributed. So watermarks should be readable even after multiple copy procedures. By choosing suitable features a blind detection of the watermark is possible.

Background and purpose: To assess the correlation between different general and organ specific quality of life and morbidity scoring methods in a cohort of men treated with radical radiotherapy for prostate cancer. Materials and methods: Men who had been treated with radical radiotherapy (50 Gy in 16 fractions over 21 days) for localized prostate cancer more than 3 years previously and who had no evidence of recurrent disease were invited to take part in the study. A total of 101 of 135 invited patients agreed and completed LENT/SOMA, UCLA Prostate Cancer Index, and 36 item RAND Health survey questionnaires. Results: The patients had comparable results with other published series with respect to the UCLA and SF-36 indices. There was significant correlation between the corresponding parts of the UCLA and LENT/SOMA scales (P<0.0005). However, for the same symptoms, a patient tended to score lower (worse) on the UCLA scale in comparison to LENT/SOMA. The relationship between the average LENT/SOMA score and maximum score was also not straightforward with each set of data revealing different information. Conclusions: The LENT/SOMA questions were, in the main, more wide-ranging and informative than the UCLA index. It is helpful to give both the overall and maximum LENT/SOMA scores to most efficiently use all of the data. There may need to be a further LENT/SOMA question to allow both symptoms of tenesmus and faecal urgency to be fully addressed

Full Text Available Background/Aim: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the clinical significance of visualized area percentage assessment of cleansing score (AAC and computed assessment of cleansing score (CAC of these two small bowel cleanliness scores systems for capsule endoscopy (CE. Materials and Methods: The reliability and consistency of the AAC and CAC scores were evaluated by comparing the scores by two examiners (one expert, one without any training in CE. Reliability was determined using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC and consistency was determined using the kappa statistic. Results: The inter-observer agreement was excellent for both the AAC and CAC scores. For AAC, the ICC was 0.791 (95% confidence interval: 0.677-0.868, and for CAC the ICC was 1.000. Using 1.5 as the cutoff, there was no significant difference between AAC and CAC results by the expert examiner (kappa = 0.756, P = 0.000 or the non-expert examiner (kappa = 0.831, P = 0.000. Evaluation of small bowel cleanliness using AAC took 15-30 min, and evaluation using CAC took about 2-3 min. The overall adequacy assessment (OAA using the AAC was not significantly different between the two examiners (χ2 = 0.586, P = 0.444. There were also no significant differences between the OAA using the AAC and the OAA using the CAC by the expert examiner (χ2 = 1.730, P = 0.188 or the non-expert examiner (χ2 = 1.124, P = 0.289. Conclusion: Both of these scores for assessment of small bowel cleanliness can be useful in clinical practice, but the CAC is simpler to use.

Full Text Available OBJECTIVES: The objectives of this study were: 1 To determine the component needed to generate a validated DIC score during pregnancy. 2 To validate such scoring system in the identification of patients with clinical diagnosis of DIC. MATERIAL AND METHODS: This is a population based retrospective study, including all women who gave birth at the 'Soroka University Medical Center' during the study period, and have had blood coagulation tests including complete blood cell count, prothrombin time (PT(seconds, partial thromboplastin time (aPTT, fibrinogen, and D-dimers. Nomograms for pregnancy were established, and DIC score was constructed based on ROC curve analyses. RESULTS: 1 maternal plasma fibrinogen concentrations increased during pregnancy; 2 maternal platelet count decreased gradually during gestation; 3 the PT and PTT values did not change with advancing gestation; 4 PT difference had an area under the curve (AUC of 0.96 (p<0.001, and a PT difference ≥1.55 had an 87% sensitivity and 90% specificity for the diagnosis of DIC; 5 the platelet count had an AUC of 0.87 (p<0.001, an 86% sensitivity and 71% specificity for the diagnosis of DIC; 6 fibrinogen concentrations had an AUC of 0.95 (p<0.001 and a cutoff point ≤3.9 g/L had a sensitivity of 87% and a specificity of 92% for the development of DIC; and 7 The pregnancy adjusted DIC score had an AUC of 0.975 (p<0.001 and at a cutoff point of ≥26 had a sensitivity of 88%, a specificity of 96%, a LR(+ of 22 and a LR(- of 0.125 for the diagnosis of DIC. CONCLUSION: We could establish a sensitive and specific pregnancy adjusted DIC score. The positive likelihood ratio of this score suggests that a patient with a score of ≥26 has a high probability to have DIC.

Although nutrition has been advocated as a major determinant of healthy ageing (HA), studies investigating the link between dietary quality and HA are scarce. We investigated the association between adherence to French food-based and nutrient-based guidelines at midlife, as assessed by three dietary scores, and HA. HA was assessed in 2007-2009, among 2329 participants of the SUpplémentation en Vitamines et Minéraux AntioXydants study aged 45-60 years at baseline (1994-1995) and initially free of diabetes, CVD and cancer. HA was defined as not developing any major chronic disease, good physical and cognitive functioning, no limitations in instrumental activities of daily living, no depressive symptoms, no health-related limitations in social life, good overall self-perceived health and no function-limiting pain. Data from repeated 24-h dietary records provided at baseline permitted the computation of the modified French Programme National Nutrition Santé-Guideline Score (mPNNS-GS), the Probability of Adequate Nutrient Intake Dietary Score (PANDiet) and the Diet Quality Index-International (DQI-I). Associations of these scores with HA were assessed by logistic regression. In 2007-2009, 42 % of men and 36 % of women met our criteria of HA. After adjustment for potential confounders, higher scores of the mPNNS-GS (ORquartile 4 v. quartile 1 1·44; 95 % CI 1·10, 1·87; P trend=0·006) and the PANDiet (1·28; 95 % CI 1·00, 1·64; P trend=0·03) were associated with higher odds of HA. We observed no association between DQI-I and HA. In conclusion, this study suggests a beneficial long-term role of high adherence to both food-based and nutrient-based French dietary guidelines for a HA process. PMID:27301412

Full Text Available Background Bipolar disorder (BD patients have been reported to be associated higher creativity abilities, and recent data tend to support the hypothesis that dopaminergic system that could be associated with creativity. Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT is one of the major enzymes involved in the metabolic degradation of dopamine. The COMT gene polymorphism (rs4680 or Val158Met Met allele is reported to cause decreased activity of this enzyme in prefrontal cortex and improve performance in several cognitive domains. Objective The objective of this study was to evaluate the influence of Val158Met on creativity in BD type I and healthy controls. Methods Ninety-seven healthy volunteers and 120 BD type I were genotyped for COMT rs4680 and tested for creativity (Barrow Welsh Art Scale – BWAS and intelligence Wechsler Abbreviated Scale of Intelligence (WASI. Results COMT Met allele positively influenced creativity scores in healthy controls but not in BD subjects during mood episodes and euthymia. The presence of allele Met did not influence IQ scores. No influence of IQ total score on creativity was observed. Limitations control group presented higher IQ scores and euthymic group was under medication use. Discussion Our research suggests positive effect of COMT rs4680 (allele Met on creativity scores in healthy controls. One possible interpretation is that creativity is more likely to be associated with lesser degrees of bipolarity. The fact that the same results were not observed in BD may be associated to dysfunctions in the dopaminergic system that characterizes this disorder. Further studies with larger samples and other types of BD should explore the role of the dopaminergic system in creativity.

The goal of this study was to compare 5 actigraphy scoring methods in a sample of 18 remitted patients with bipolar disorder. Actigraphy records were processed using five different scoring methods relying on the sleep diary; the event-marker; the software-provided automatic algorithm; the automatic algorithm supplemented by the event-marker; visual inspection (VI) only. The algorithm and the VI methods differed from the other methods for many actigraphy parameters of interest. Particularly, the algorithm method yielded longer sleep duration, and the VI method yielded shorter sleep latency compared to the other methods. The present findings provide guidance for the selection of signal processing method based on sleep parameters of interest, time-cue sources and availability, and related scoring time costs for the study. PMID:23205606

The concepts of systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) and scoring system were defined by the journal of Bone in 1992. SIRS was described as occurrence of two or more clinical criteria in four ones (fever or hypothermia, tachypnea, tachycardia, and leukocytosis).An early diagnosis and estimation of systemic inflammation in patients is helpful for treatment selection. This paper reviews the application of SIRS scoring system, which has been extensively validated for large groups of critical care patients with severe injury and critical surgical diseases.Recent studies have documented SIRS score as a significant predictive parameter of adverse outcome in critical care patients. Furthermore, some studies also give us a suggestion on how to reduce the overload systemic response.

The heterogeneity of diabetes mellitus, and the various metabolic abnormalities associated with it, are well known. Current management guidelines used to help choose glucose-lowering drugs in diabetes mellitus describe various drug classes in detail, but do not take the overall metabolic profile into consideration. To help physicians choose appropriate oral therapy, we propose a discrete metabolic score, based upon the presence and absence of metabolic comorbidities included in the definition of metabolic syndrome. This communication describes how to choose an appropriate oral antidiabetic drug using such a score. The metabolic score based decision making aid should be able to prove its utility in all health care settings, especially resource constrained societies. PMID:26564303

AIMS: Recent European guidelines recommend to include high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol in risk assessment for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease (CVD), using a SCORE-based risk model (SCORE-HDL). We compared the predictive performance of SCORE-HDL with SCORE in an independent...... with SCORE, but deteriorated risk classification based on NRI. Future guidelines should consider lower decision thresholds and prioritize CVD morbidity and people above age 65....

Full Text Available Background Sepsis remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality among critically ill children in the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU. Procalcitonin and lactate have been used as biomarkers of sepsis, as they have been correlated with disease severity, organ failure and death. The Pediatric Logistic Organ Dysfunction (PELOD score is a tool to assess the severity of organ dysfunction in critically ill children. Objective To investigate the correlation between PELOD score and procalcitonin and lactate levels in pediatric sepsis. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted in children with sepsis who were admitted to the PICU from April to July 2012. Sepsis was defined as systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS, as a result of suspected or proven infection. Proven infection was defined as positive culture findings (blood, urine ot other specimens and/or serum procalcitonin >2 ng/mL. Spearman’s test was used to assess for correlations between PELOD scores and procalcitonin as well as lactate levels. Results Thirty-two patients were analyzed, consisting of 18 males and 14 females with an age range of 1-432 months (median 21 months. There was no statistically significant correlation between procalcitonin level and PELOD score (r=- 0.186, 95%CI -0.502 to 0.174, P=0.308 nor between lactate level(r=-0.069, 95%CI-0.408 to 0.287, P=0.709 and PELOD score. Conclusion Serum procalcitonin and lactate levels are not correlated with PELOD scores in children with sepsis.

Full Text Available We examine the results on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS, the highest-profile state testing program and one that has recorded extraordinary recent gains in math and reading scores. To investigate whether the dramatic math and reading gains on the TAAS represent actual academic progress, we have compared these gains to score changes in Texas on another test, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP. Texas students did improve significantly more on a fourth-grade NAEP math test than their counterparts nationally. But, the size of this gain was smaller than their gains on TAAS and was not present on the eighth-grade math test. The stark differences between the stories told by NAEP and TAAS are especially striking when it comes to the gap in average scores between whites and students of color. According to the NAEP results, that gap in Texas is not only very large but increasing slightly. According to TAAS scores, the gap is much smaller and decreasing greatly. Many schools are devoting a great deal of class time to highly specific TAAS preparation. While this preparation may improve TAAS scores, it may not help students develop necessary reading and math skills. Schools with relatively large percentages of minority and poor students may be doing this more than other schools. We raise serious questions about the validity of those gains, and caution against the danger of making decisions to sanction or reward students, teachers and schools on the basis of test scores that may be inflated or misleading. Finally, we suggest some steps that states can take to increase the likelihood that their test results merit public confidence and provide a sound basis for educational policy.

Full Text Available This study reviews the developments of automated scoring systems and techniques over the past 40 years and the strengths and weaknesses of each technique are analyzed in detail. Results of the study showed that automated scoring systems are becoming more complicated and advanced by the integrated use of knowledge in natural language processing, statistics, information retrieval, corpus linguistics, etc. but they still have drawbacks in one or two aspects. The study provides some valuable insights into further studies in this line.

Full Text Available "nCoronary artery disease is the single largest cause of mortality, and is implicated in one of every five deaths. Conventional risk factors fail to identify one third of deaths caused by CAD. The currently available screening tools for coronary artery disease include Framingham risk assessment, clinical examination, and stress testing. "nIt is of interest that most coronary events occur in the territory of coronary arteries that do not demonstrate prior high grade stenosis. "nComplications of atherosclerotic plaque such as rupture or erosion with subsequent thrombus formation are important events leading to acute coronary syndrome. "nMany different factors including plaque composition, hemodynamic, endothelial function, and blood thrombogenicity may influence which plaques lead to hemodynamically significant events. "nNonetheless, there is a strong relation between the extent of coronary plaque burden and the risk of coronary event. "nSince atherosclerosis is the only disease process associated with calcification of coronary arteries, the degree of coronary calcification as demonstrated by CT is predictive of the overall burden of atherosclerotic plaque. "nThe role of coronary calcium scoring in assessing the risk for future coronary events has been a subject of considerable controversy. It is most important to understand that an elevated burden of coronary calcium may not indicate the presence of significant coronary stenosis, but is associated with a higher risk of a coronary event. "nCalcium scoring is based on the identification of high density material within the coronary circulation on a noncontrast CTscan. Both the EBCT and MDCT have been used for the evaluation of coronary calcium. "nThe current literature suggests that MDCT is comparable to EBCT for coronary calcium screening. "nCalcium scoring is a simple test that should take no more than 5 minutes. A prospective ECG gated scan with 3 mm slice thickness is obtained from the level of

BCS provides an important evaluation of the energy status of cows in puerperal period. This evaluation method provides a subjective indication of the fat cover on cows. To evaluate BCS is used a scoring point system based on the fat deposited in external part of the cow. In this study to evaluate BCS in cows in different farms we used 1 to 9 scoring system. The data shows different BCS classes between cows in different farms. All farms included in study shows that the BCS level is lower than ...

Full Text Available The Lithuanian Informatics Olympiad is a problem solving contest for high school students. The work of each contestant is evaluated in terms of several criteria, where each criterion is measured according to its own scale (but the same scale for each contestant. Several jury members are involved in the evaluation. This paper analyses the problem how to calculate the aggregated score for whole submission in the above mentioned situation. The chosen methodology for solving this problem is Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA. The outcome of this paper is the score aggregation method proposed to be applied in LitIO developed using MCDA approaches.

In this work, a combined statistical and image analysis method to automatically evaluate the severity of scaling in psoriasis lesions is proposed. The method separates the different regions of the disease in the image and scores the degree of scaling based on the properties of these areas. The...... proposed method provides a solution to the lack of suitable methods to assess the lesion and to evaluate changes during the treatment. An experiment over a collection of psoriasis images is conducted to test the performance of the method. Results show that the obtained scores are highly correlated with...

This paper describes basic facts regarding the black-white test score gap over the first four years of school. Black children enter school substantially behind their white counterparts in reading and math, but including a small number of covariates erases the gap. Over the first four years of school, however, blacks lose substantial ground relative to other races; averaging .10 standard deviations per school year. By the end of third grade there is a large Black-White test score gap that cann...

Protein-protein interactions play a crucial role in the cellular process such as metabolic pathways and immunological recognition. This paper presents a new domain score-based support vector machine (SVM) to infer protein interactions, which can be used not only to explore all possible domain interactions by the kernel method, but also to reflect the evolutionary conservation of domains in proteins by using the domain scores of proteins. The experimental result on the Saccharomyces cerevisiae dataset demonstrates that this approach can predict protein-protein interactions with higher performances compared to the existing approaches.

Iris recognition technology, used to identify individuals by photographing the iris of their eye, has become popular in security applications because of its ease of use, accuracy, and safety in controlling access to high-security areas. Fusion of multiple algorithms for biometric verification performance improvement has received considerable attention. The proposed method combines the zero-crossing 1 D wavelet Euler number, and genetic algorithm based for feature extraction. The output from these three algorithms is normalized and their score are fused to decide whether the user is genuine or imposter. This new strategies is discussed in this paper, in order to compute a multimodal combined score.

As a non-imaging wide-angle Cherenkov air shower detector array with an area of up to 100 km2, the HiSCORE (Hundred⁎i Square km Cosmic ORigin Explorer) detector concept allows measurements of gamma rays and cosmic rays in an energy range of 10 TeV up to 1 EeV. In the framework of the Tunka-HiSCORE project we have started measurements with a small prototype array, and planned to build an engineering array (1 km2) on the site of the Tunka experiment in Siberia. The first results and the most important hardware components are presented here

We describe a novel knowledge-based protein-ligand scoring function that employs a new definition for the reference state, allowing us to relate a statistical potential to a Lennard-Jones (LJ) potential. In this way, the LJ potential parameters were generated from protein-ligand complex structural data contained in the PDB. Forty-nine types of atomic pairwise interactions were derived using this method, which we call the knowledge-based and empirical combined scoring algorithm (KECSA). Two validation benchmarks were introduced to test the performance of KECSA. The first validation benchmark included two test sets that address the training-set and enthalpy/entropy of KECSA The second validation benchmark suite included two large-scale and five small-scale test sets to compare the reproducibility of KECSA with respect to two empirical score functions previously developed in our laboratory (LISA and LISA+), as well as to other well-known scoring methods. Validation results illustrate that KECSA shows improved performance in all test sets when compared with other scoring methods especially in its ability to minimize the RMSE. LISA and LISA+ displayed similar performance using the correlation coefficient and Kendall τ as the metric of quality for some of the small test sets. Further pathways for improvement are discussed which would KECSA more sensitive to subtle changes in ligand structure. PMID:23560465

Fifty-one patients with mild (n = 14), moderate (n = 10) and severe traumatic brain injury (n = 27) received early rehabilitation. Level of consciousness was evaluated using the Glasgow Coma Score. Functional level was determined using the Glasgow Outcome Score, whilst mobility was evaluated using the Mobility Scale for Acute Stroke. Activities of daily living were assessed using the Barthel Index. Following Bobath neurodevelopmental therapy, the level of consciousness was significantly improved in patients with moderate and severe traumatic brain injury, but was not greatly influenced in patients with mild traumatic brain injury. Mobility and functional level were significantly improved in patients with mild, moderate and severe traumatic brain injury. Gait recovery was more obvious in patients with mild traumatic brain injury than in patients with moderate and severe traumatic brain injury. Activities of daily living showed an improvement but this was insignificant except for patients with severe traumatic brain injury. Nevertheless, complete recovery was not acquired at discharge. Multiple regression analysis showed that gait and Glasgow Coma Scale scores can be considered predictors of functional outcomes following traumatic brain injury. PMID:25624828

Fifty-one patients with mild (n = 14), moderate (n = 10) and severe traumatic brain injury (n = 27)received early rehabilitation. Level of consciousness was evaluated using the Glasgow Coma Score. Functional level was determined using the Glasgow Outcome Score, whilst mobility was evaluated using the Mobility Scale for Acute Stroke. Activities of daily living were assessed using the Barthel Index. Following Bobath neurodevelopmental therapy, the level of consciousness was significantly improved in patients with moderate and severe traumatic brain injury, but was not greatly influenced in patients with mild traumatic brain injury. Mobility and functional level were significantly improved in patients with mild, moderate and severe traumatic brain injury. Gait recovery was more obvious in patients with mild traumatic brain injury than in patients with moderate and severe traumatic brain injury. Activities of daily living showed an improvement but this was insignificant except for patients with severe traumatic brain injury. Nevertheless, complete recovery was not acquired at discharge. Multiple regression analysis showed that gait and Glasgow Coma Scale scores can be considered predictors of functional outcomes following traumatic brain injury.

In the past 3 years, the Tunka-HiSCORE collaboration has installed HiSCORE timing air Cherenkov detectors in the Tunka valley in Siberia. Since October 2013, a 9-station prototype array is in operation. These activities have merged into the recently founded TAIGA collaboration, which is currently building a non-imaging air Cherenkov array consisting today of 29 stations, which will be upgraded to 1 square-km. Furthermore, the deployment of a 4m diameter imaging air Cherenkov telescope is planned within 2015. Our aim is to combine the timing and imaging techniques on a large scale in order to optimize the air Cherenkov detection technique for energies above 10 TeV and up to several 100 TeV. Simulations show a clear potential of the planned hybrid event reconstruction. The status of our experiment and our future plans are presented.

Full Text Available Background: Preeclampsia has great implication on adverse neonatal outcome. Appearance, pulse, grimace, activity, respiration (APGAR score at 1 or 5 minutes is one of the indicators of physiologic maturity of the infant. Therefore, the aim of this study was to know the correlation of APGAR score in preeclamptic deliveries with its risk factors. Methods: This study was a retrospective cohort. Data were collected from January to December 2013 including all preeclamptic women with singleton live pregnancies who delivered their babies in Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital, Jakarta. The primary outcome was APGAR score. There were some determinants conducted in this study. Binary logistic was used as multivariate analysis to analyze the correlation between APGAR score and risk factors of preeclampsia, data were analyzed using chi square test. Results: Out of 450 preeclamptic women, 446 of them met the inclusion criteria. Low APGAR scores at 1 and 5 minutes were found in 19% (86/446 and 5.4% (24/446 of neonates respectively. Early onset of preeclampsia (adjusted OR = 4.577; 95% CI = 2.147 - 9.757, white blood cell ≥ 15,000/μL (adjusted OR = 3.315; 95% CI = 1.738 – 6.324, HELLP syndrome (adjusted OR = 2.00; 95% CI = 1.38 – 2.91 were independent risk factors for having infant with low APGAR score at 1 minute. Meanwhile, there was no significant risk factors at 5 minutes APGAR score after adjustment.Conclusion: Leukocytosis, early onset preeclampsia, preterm birth, and thrombocytopenia, severity of preeclampsia, and HELLP syndrome are independent risks of having infant born with low APGAR score at 1 minute in preeclamptic deliveries.

To design and validate a scoring system for tomosynthesis (digital tomography) in pulmonary cystic fibrosis. A scoring system dedicated to tomosynthesis in pulmonary cystic fibrosis was designed. Three radiologists independently scored 88 pairs of radiographs and tomosynthesis examinations of the chest in 60 patients with cystic fibrosis and 7 oncology patients. Radiographs were scored according to the Brasfield scoring system and tomosynthesis examinations were scored using the new scoring system. Observer agreements for the tomosynthesis score were almost perfect for the total score with square-weighted kappa >0.90, and generally substantial to almost perfect for subscores. Correlation between the tomosynthesis score and the Brasfield score was good for the three observers (Kendall's rank correlation tau 0.68, 0.77 and 0.78). Tomosynthesis was generally scored higher as a percentage of the maximum score. Observer agreements for the total score for Brasfield score were almost perfect (square-weighted kappa 0.80, 0.81 and 0.85). The tomosynthesis scoring system seems robust and correlates well with the Brasfield score. Compared with radiography, tomosynthesis is more sensitive to cystic fibrosis changes, especially bronchiectasis and mucus plugging, and the new tomosynthesis scoring system offers the possibility of more detailed and accurate scoring of disease severity. (orig.)

To design and validate a scoring system for tomosynthesis (digital tomography) in pulmonary cystic fibrosis. A scoring system dedicated to tomosynthesis in pulmonary cystic fibrosis was designed. Three radiologists independently scored 88 pairs of radiographs and tomosynthesis examinations of the chest in 60 patients with cystic fibrosis and 7 oncology patients. Radiographs were scored according to the Brasfield scoring system and tomosynthesis examinations were scored using the new scoring system. Observer agreements for the tomosynthesis score were almost perfect for the total score with square-weighted kappa >0.90, and generally substantial to almost perfect for subscores. Correlation between the tomosynthesis score and the Brasfield score was good for the three observers (Kendall's rank correlation tau 0.68, 0.77 and 0.78). Tomosynthesis was generally scored higher as a percentage of the maximum score. Observer agreements for the total score for Brasfield score were almost perfect (square-weighted kappa 0.80, 0.81 and 0.85). The tomosynthesis scoring system seems robust and correlates well with the Brasfield score. Compared with radiography, tomosynthesis is more sensitive to cystic fibrosis changes, especially bronchiectasis and mucus plugging, and the new tomosynthesis scoring system offers the possibility of more detailed and accurate scoring of disease severity. (orig.)

This study presents a general framework for single-administration reliability methods, such as Cronbach's alpha, Guttman's lambda-2, and method MS. This general framework was used to derive a new approach to estimating test-score reliability by means of the unrestricted latent class model. This new approach is the latent class reliability…

A vital aspect of an answer is the confidence that goes along with it. Misstating the level of confidence one has in the answer can have devastating outcomes. However, confidence assessment is rarely emphasized during typical engineering education. The confidence-based scoring method described in this study encourages students to both think about…

Previous studies have compared calipers for propensity score (PS) matching, but none have considered calipers for matching on the disease risk score (DRS). We used Medicare claims data to perform 3 cohort studies of medication initiators: a study of raloxifene versus alendronate in 1-year nonvertebral fracture risk, a study of cyclooxygenase 2 inhibitors versus nonselective nonsteroidal antiinflammatory medications in 6-month gastrointestinal bleeding, and a study of simvastatin + ezetimibe versus simvastatin alone in 6-month cardiovascular outcomes. The study periods for each cohort were 1998 through 2005, 1999 through 2002, and 2004 through 2005, respectively. In each cohort, we calculated 1) a DRS, 2) a prognostic PS which included the DRS as the independent variable in a PS model, and 3) the PS for each patient. We then nearest-neighbor matched on each score in a variable ratio and a fixed ratio within 8 calipers based on the standard deviation of the logit and the natural score scale. When variable ratio matching on the DRS, a caliper of 0.05 on the natural scale performed poorly when the outcome was rare. The prognostic PS did not appear to offer any consistent practical benefits over matching on the DRS directly. In general, logit-based calipers or calipers smaller than 0.05 on the natural scale performed well when DRS matching in all examples. PMID:27037270

A relatively simple and convenient score test of normality in the bivariate probit model is derived. Monte Carlo simulations show that the small sample performance of the bootstrapped test is quite good. The test may be readily extended to testing normality in related models.

Homeschooling, one of the fastest growing educational alternatives, is enjoying increasing respect from educators and parents alike. This is partly because homeschooling children score as well and often better on standardized tests than their publicly schooled counterparts. However, the vast majority of homeschooled students come from the…

Background: The Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) is a parent-completed screening questionnaire often used to measure autism spectrum disorders (ASD) severity. Although child characteristics are known to influence scores from other ASD-symptom measures, as well as parent-questionnaires more

Describes a method for assessing the performance of public libraries using a standardized scoring system and provides an analysis of public library data from New Jersey as an example. Library standards and the derivation of measurement ratios are also discussed. A 33-item bibliography and three data tables are included. (JL)

Presented at the national conference for AERA (American Educational Research Association) in April 2009. The large variability of SAT taker population across states makes state-by-state comparisons of the SAT scores challenging. Using a mixture modeling approach, therefore, the current study presents a method of identifying subpopulations in terms…

BACKGROUND: The selection of presentations at orthopedic meetings is an important process. If the peer reviewers do not consistently agree on the quality score, the review process is arbitrary and open to bias. The aim of this study was: (1) to describe the inter-reviewer agreement of a previously d

Full Text Available Abstract Background Coronary artery calcification (CAC measured by electron-beam computed tomography (EBCT has been well studied in the prediction of coronary artery disease (CAD. We sought to evaluate the impact of the CAC score in the diagnostic process immediately after its introduction in a large tertiary referral centre. Methods 598 patients with no history of CAD who underwent EBCT for evaluation of CAD were retrospectively included into the study. Ischemia detection test results (exercise stress test, single photon emission computed tomography or ST segment analysis on 24 hours ECG detection, as well as the results of coronary angiography (CAG were collected. Results The mean age of the patients was 55 ± 11 years (57% male. Patients were divided according to CAC scores; group A Conclusion Our study showed that patients with a high CAC score are more often referred for CAG. The CAC scores can be used as an aid in daily cardiology practice to determine further decision making.

Presents Bishop Ward High School (Kansas) as a case study that has seen great improvements in standardized testing results by changing its approach. States that realignment of curriculum, adjusting instructional strategies, and accommodating students with special needs are important aspects of raising assessment scores in high schools. (CJW)

Studied the effects of overlapping some test items across consecutive test levels by using overlapping and nonoverlapping items with 834 prematched and 782 matched elementary school students and focusing on whether there is an effect on achievement test scores due to item familiarization. No effects were detected. (SLD)

This paper reports the partitioning of variance in scale scores from the use of three classroom environment instruments. Data sets from the administration of the What Is Happening In this Class (WIHIC) to 4,146 students, the Questionnaire on Teacher Interaction (QTI) to 2,167 students and the Catholic School Classroom Environment Questionnaire…

A widely held view is that good schools are essential to a nation's international economic success and that high test scores on international tests of academic skills and knowledge indicate how good a nation's schools are. The widespread belief that good schools are an important contributor to a nation's economic success in the world is supported…

At a time when the national conversation is focused on lagging upward mobility, it is no surprise that many educators point to poverty as the explanation for mediocre test scores among U.S. students compared to those of students in other countries. If American teachers in struggling U.S. schools taught in Finland, says Finnish educator Pasi…

Background: Schizophrenia is consistently associated with lower IQ compared to the IQ of control groups, or estimated premorbid IQ. It is not likely that the IQ scores deteriorate during the prodromal phase or first psychotic episode; they are already present before the onset of the prodromal phase

The researcher interviewed two groups of eleventh grade students, in a rural Appalachian setting, who tended to score low on the state mandated high stakes/low stakes test to discover their efforts on the test, specifically in reading, and to obtain their opinions concerning the effects of a specific incentive or consequence. Before the eleventh…

Many African Americans were imbued with the cliché that they must work twice as hard as others to be a success in life. Entering college, students with this belief put extensive effort into earning top grades to ensure quality preparation for their chosen career; yet, some fail to earn top scores. Why? This is the million dollar question, but the…

Irradiation mucositis is defined as an inflammatory-like process of the oropharyngeal mucosa following therapeutic irradiation of patients who have head and neck cancer. Clinically, it is a serious side effect because severe mucositis can cause generalized problems (weight loss, nasogastic tube feedings) and interferes with the well-being of the patient seriously. Grading mucositis is important for the evaluation of preventive and therapeutic measures. The object of this study was to develop a scoring method based on local mucositis signs only. Four clinical local signs of mucositis were used in this score: white discoloration, erythema, pseudomembranes and ulceration. Mucositis of the oral cavity was calcualted during conventional irradiation protocol for 8 distinguishable areas using the 4 signs and their extent. A prospective evaluation of this method in 15 irradiated head and neck cancer patients displayed an S-curve reflecting a symptomless first irradiation week, followed by a rapid and steady increase of white discoloration, erythema and pseudomembranes during the second and third week. Oral candidiasis, generalized symptoms such as weight loss and the highest mucositis scores were seen after 3 weeks irradiation. The novel mucositis scoring method may be of value in studying the effect of hygiene programs, topical application of disinfectans or antibiotics on oral mucositis. (author)

Background: Patients with refractory asthma frequently have elements of laryngopharyngeal reflux (LPR) with potential aspiration contributing to their poor control. We previously reported on a supraglottic index (SGI) scoring system that helps in the evaluation of LPR with potential aspiration. However, to further the usefulness of this SGI scoring system for bronchoscopists, a teaching system was developed that included both interobserver and intraobserver reproducibility. Methods: Five pulmonologists with expertise in fiber-optic bronchoscopy but novice to the SGI participated. A training system was developed that could be used via Internet interaction to make this learning technique widely available. Results: By the final testing, there was excellent interreader agreement (κ of at least 0.81), thus documenting reproducibility in scoring the SGI. For the measure of intrareader consistency, one reader was arbitrarily selected to rescore the final test 4 weeks later and had a κ value of 0.93, with a 95% CI of 0.79 to 1.00. Conclusions: In this study, we demonstrate that with an organized educational approach, bronchoscopists can develop skills to have highly reproducible assessment and scoring of supraglottic abnormalities. The SGI can be used to determine which patients need additional intervention to determine causes of LPR and gastroesophageal reflux. Identification of this problem in patients with refractory asthma allows for personal, individual directed therapy to improve asthma control. PMID:24202552

The Oxford Elbow Score (OES) is a patient-related outcome measure quantifying quality of life in relation to elbow disorders. This 12-item patient-administered English questionnaire comprises three domains: function, social-psychological status and pain. The purpose of this study was to examine the...

The Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory was administered to 112 African American adolescents who were academically at-risk for dropping out of high school. Results were similar to those of a previous study comparing a heterogeneous group of 100 American adolescents with 100 youths from India. Differences on scores of self-esteem for the two international groups were noted. PMID:7667445

Objective To estimate the effect of two simple filters, two or more positive peptide filter and Unified Score filter on the true positive rate of protein and peptide.Methods Twenty-two LC-MS/MS datasets were from 18 known protein mixture. Two or more positive peptide filter and Unified Score filter were applied to the 22 datasets. The filters effect was evaluated according to the true positive rate of protein and peptide for each filter.Results The positive rates of protein and peptide from two or more peptide filter raised from 56.49% to 92.86%-99.12% (for protein) and from 90.67% to 97.74%-99.62% (for peptide), but many positive proteins were filtered out.The positive rates of protein and peptide from Unified Score (ThermoFinnigan value 2400) were only about 35.51% and 82.99%, but after adjusted the value (3900) according to the number of false positive peptide, those positive rate raised to 63.61% (for protein) and 91.97% (for peptide).Conclusions Two or more peptides requirement could significantly decrease false positive rate, but it also may filter out many true positive proteins especially low molecular weight and less abundant proteins. Unified Score may be a better filter than Xcorr and DeltaCn combination and the value of 3900 is found to be more suitable for this particular datasets.

Objective: We endeavored to develop an unruptured intracranial aneurysm (UIA) treatment score (UIATS) model that includes and quantifies key factors involved in clinical decision-making in the management of UIAs and to assess agreement for this model among specialists in UIA management and research.

Irradiation mucositis is defined as an inflammatory-like process of the oropharyngeal mucosa following therapeutic irradiation of patients who have head and neck cancer. Clinically, it is a serious side effect because severe mucositis can cause generalized problems (weight loss, nasogastic tube feedings) and interferes with the well-being of the patient seriously. Grading mucositis is important for the evaluation of preventive and therapeutic measures. The object of this study was to develop a scoring method based on local mucositis signs only. Four clinical local signs of mucositis were used in this score: white discoloration, erythema, pseudomembranes and ulceration. Mucositis of the oral cavity was calcualted during conventional irradiation protocol for 8 distinguishable areas using the 4 signs and their extent. A prospective evaluation of this method in 15 irradiated head and neck cancer patients displayed an S-curve reflecting a symptomless first irradiation week, followed by a rapid and steady increase of white discoloration, erythema and pseudomembranes during the second and third week. Oral candidiasis, generalized symptoms such as weight loss and the highest mucositis scores were seen after 3 weeks irradiation. The novel mucositis scoring method may be of value in studying the effect of hygiene programs, topical application of disinfectans or antibiotics on oral mucositis. (author).

Latent difference score (LDS) models combine benefits derived from autoregressive and latent growth curve models allowing for time-dependent influences and systematic change. The specification and descriptions of LDS models include an initial level of ability or trait plus an accumulation of changes. A limitation of this specification is that the…

The literature on predefined indexes of overall diet quality is reviewed. Their association with nutrient adequacy and health outcome is considered, but our primary interest is in the make-up of the scores. In total, twenty different indexes have been reviewed, four of which have gained most attenti

Investigates the relationship of Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 Scales L, K, and Mf with Verbal, Performance, and Full Scale IQs from the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised; achievement scores in reading, spelling, and arithmetic; and total years of education as self-reported by the study research participants. (RJM)

Gum chewing has been shown to improve cognitive performance in adults; however, gum chewing has not been evaluated in children. This study examined the effects of gum chewing on standardized test scores and class grades of eighth grade math students. Math classes were randomized to a gum chewing (GC) condition that provided students with gum…

There are many students who could profit from increasing their scores by even 50 points. It can mean the difference between getting into a "reach" or a "safety" school. Thus, there are a large number of students who could benefit from a book like this. Most of the books on the market are geared toward the great number of average students who,…

This article presents considerations for using automated scoring systems to evaluate second language writing. A distinction is made between English language learners in English-medium educational systems and those studying English in their own countries for a variety of purposes, and between learning-to-write and writing-to-learn in a second…

Examines relationships between structural characteristics of students' concept maps about chemical equilibrium and independent measures of their achievement in chemistry. Results indicate significant relationships between multidimensional scaling coordinates and test scores of recall of knowledge and its application and also reveal structural…